What Happens to Your Digital Assets When You Die?

0:30 Well, good afternoon, Michiganders. Today is Tuesday, June second, twenty twenty five, and of course this is Tuesday with Tom, Michigan's Only podcast where we talk about estate planning, a state settlement, and everything in between. I'm your host, Tom Doyle, the state planning attorney, lifelong Michigander, and your guide to planning for the future. Last episode was what happens if you die without a will in Michigan. So if you don't have an estate plan together, you don't have a will, you don't have your affairs. In order, I encourage you listen to last week's episode where you will learn what is going to happen if you die without a will in Michigan. Today today we're talking about something that's becoming increasingly important, but again is often overlooked, and those are your digital assets. Thats include your emails, your social media accounts, online banking, cloud storage, and yes, even your Netflix subscription.

1:53 And more importantly, what happens to all of that when you die And that's where the Michigan Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act comes in. But just a quick note before we get started. What I'm about to discuss is meant to be educational and informative. It is not legal advice. Every person's situation is different, so be sure to talk with your own attorney to figure out what makes sense for you and your estate plan. What happens to your digital assets when you die? Well, let's start with what is the Michigan Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act. In simple terms, this law that was passed in twenty twenty six gives your fiduciary that's going to be your person representative or a trustee or an agent under a financial power of attorney. But it gives your fiduciary the legal authority to access your digital assets when you're incapacitated or after you die. Before this law, fiduciaries often hit a brick wall when trying to access things like Gmail, Facebook,

3:29 iCloud accounts because companies cited privacy laws and refused access even if you had named the person in your will. So the problem was you died, your personal representative tried to get access to your Gmail account and Google said sorry, we're not giving you access because of privacy law. Well, Michigan law fixes that. Michigan law is modeled after a national law that's called the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, a lot of words often shortened to the are you FADDA? Not sure? That is much clearer than the name itself. But why does this matter? Well, imagine your family is trying to maybe recover important financial records better stored in your email. Maybe you get monthly statements emailed to you rather than mailed to you by your bank. Maybe they're looking to shut down your Facebook account to try and to avoid scams going forward once you've died. Or another example, perhaps you store photos and videos in the cloud and your family is trying to access them. Well, without legal access, they could be locked out permanently. So this law helps to make sure your fiduciary can legally request and manage those digital assets. But

5:03 here's the catch. You need to explicitly authorize that access. So how do you do that? How do you grant access? Well, there are three main ways to give your fiduciary access to your digital assets under the Act. One are online tools. Companies such as Google and Facebook lets you set up access directly through their platform. For example, Google's Inactive Account manager lets you name someone to take over your account after certain period of inactivity. So if you have a Google account, you can go over to the inactivity account manner and you can set it up so that if there's a defined period of inactivity on your account, which presumably is because you have died or becoming capacitated, then Google will notify the person that you wanted to have access to the account. So that's online tools working with the online services that you're already working with. Second, your state plan, your will, your trust, your durable power of attorneys should include language authorizing your fiduciary to access digital assets if you want them to access those digital assets. Now, we do have some situations where clients might not want

6:34 someone to access certain digital assets after the desk, so you might have to define which assets, if you've got that situation, are to be accessed in which are not Number three terms of service. If you don't do the first two, if you don't use an online tool that's provided by the company, or you don't provide it in your state plan, then the companies terms of service, Yes, those long agreements that we all skip over, we never read them before agreeing to them, will control what your fiduciary can or can't do. So bottom line, if you want to control and give your fiduciary access, you need to plan ahead. So what can someone access? Well, essentially, the loss splits access into two things, content and catalog.

7:38 Catalog is what is oftentimes referred to as metadata. For example, knowing you emailed someone is metadata, but it is not what was said. What was said is actually the content of the message. So sometimes people are gonna only receive the metadata, like you send an email, if you're not clear in what it is, you want them to have access too. So catalog again, is that metadata that something got sent. Content is the actual message that was sent. So for douciaries generally need explicit permission to access the content.

8:26 For example, just saying that my executor can manage my estate isn't enough. You really need to spell it out. So what should you do? Well, I'm going to give you your Tuesday to do list. One, Make a list of your digital assets and passwords. Make a list. Sometimes people don't realize how many different digital assets they are using and what those passwords are in the user name. In order to access those things. Now, then you some sort of secure password manager. If you're an Apple user, you might know that Apple has a new password app that's designed for that. There are also other online services where you can securely store passwords, et cetera. Or old school many clients write it down, but make sure that you keep it in a safe place and that no, it isn't under the keyboard to your computer. It needs to be in a safe place that somebody isn't just going to find it. But then when you do that, you obviously whether you're using a secure password manager or keeping it in a safe place, you need to make sure that your fiduciary knows where to locate it, and you're going to find that. Some of the online services where you can store store passwords might have a feature where you can set it up with the service that

10:00 if they are provided with a copy of your death certificate, they will then release that information on your assets and passwords to the person that you have designated. So it's utilized making a list and then using a secure service or password manager to track all that. Number two would be update your estate plan to include digital asset provisions. So if you look at your estate plan, look at your will, look at your trust, look at your powers of attorney. If they don't have digital asset provisions in them. That is something that you're going to want to take care of by having updates to those documents. And again use online tools where they're available. So if you have a Google account or have a Facebook account, utilize their legacy options to set up access. And if you do that, track it when you make your list of digital assets.

11:05 If it's a Google account and you're using the legacy option, notpe that in your list that you've already done that. It's a way to track what you're doing and making sure that everything has been covered. And number four, of course, talk to your estate planning attorney and yes that can be Amanda or me to make sure that you have covered those. Things in your documents.

11:54 Of course, as always, Amanda and I would be honored to help you protect the ones you love and including giving them access to your digital assets if that's what you want to do, and whether that means creating a brand new estate plan, updating an existing plan, or perhaps guiding you through the estate settlement process during a difficult time. We try to make it easy and convenient to get started. We have in person appointments available in Grand Rapids and our Lancing location, or we offer virtual consultations by zoom or food so phone or so wherever you are in Michigan, you should be able to consult with us through virtual consultations and a reminder too. If all you're looking for is an individual document, maybe all you need is a new certificate of trust or a new power of attorney.

12:53 Check out the Legal Store. That's where you can look through and you can order documents on online that can then be delivered to you through email. All of that information on how to schedule an appointment, whether it's in person or virtual, and the Legal Store, of course, is available at our website, which is Doyle LAWPC dot com. Well, I think that is going to be a wrap for today's show. Of course, if you have a comment about the program, a question that you'd like to have answered, a topic that you'd like to have covered in the future episode, simply head over to Tuesday with Time dot com.

13:58 There you can leave me a voicemail or voice message simply by clicking on the microphone, or just send me an email at Tuesday at Tom at Tuesday with Tom dot com. Please be sure to follow us on Facebook and invite your family and friends to do the same. That again is Tuesday with Tom and of course the office Facebook page is Doyle Law PC. Don't forget to subscribe chart email list at Tuesday with Tom dot com to stay up to date with new episodes and important estate planning tips. Remember, too, you can listen to Tuesday with Tom wherever you enjoy your podcast. We're on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, Google Podcast, iHeartRadio, Speaker and many many other online services and you can always just ask your smart speaker to play Tuesday with Tom. Well, thanks again for spending part of your day with this and as always, I hope you have an awesome day and an awesome week in Michigan. Stay safe. Tuesday with Tom has been brought to you by the estate planning attorneys at Doyle Law PC. To learn how we can help you with your estate plan or with settling a loved one's estate, please call us today at five one seven three two three seven three sixty six. That's five one seven three

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