How do people plan for their deaths in terms of account & device secrets (passwords, 2fa etc.)? (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 5 months ago by Whooping_Seal@sh.itjust.works to c/privacyguides@lemmy.one

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I have thought about this on and off for quite a few years now, and I was just wondering what people here have done while maintaining account / device security.

I hope people don't mind this rather morbid conversation, but how have people here planned for what will happen with their accounts, computers, self hosted things etc. in the event of their deaths? I am particularly interested in what people have planned for if they are the person in their household who is self hosting things for the household. I'm not in a living situation that allows me to self host much but it is one of the questions I've had for myself when I decide to move in with my significant other and self host more things. I don't think they could manage much of the self hosted stuff and I also don't think they can remember all of the credentials for accounts etc., is the best way of going about it sharing a keepass database or bitwarden account with them?

In regards to my accounts, I am not expecting most of my accounts to transfer, if anything I'd much rather them be deleted (and I have enabled this feature where possible). There are a few however, that I wouldn't mind leaving to someone after my passing. Is there a privacy and security preserving way of setting this up?

I guess I have just been struggling with how to do this, ideally I would want a way for accounts to transfer to someone listed in my will, but I don't think it's a good idea to give ~2-3 people a copy of my keepass databse while I am still living.

I am looking forward to hearing what people's thoughts are on this matter, and I apologize again for such a morbid topic.

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[-] ultranaut@lemmy.world 24 points 5 months ago

Bitwarden shared vault. There's also a feature where you can designate someone to gain access to your vault via a dead man's switch.

[-] Whooping_Seal@sh.itjust.works 5 points 5 months ago

You and someone else have mentioned the deadman switch, does the other person need an account or can credentials be made for them? I haven't used bitwarden in a while (since I migrated to gopass and then to keepass), so I'm guessing this is a new feature.

That is a very fascinating feature and I think I'll look into it!

[-] ultranaut@lemmy.world 5 points 5 months ago

It's been awhile since I set it up so I don't fully remember, I think they need their own bitwarden account. Here's the documentation on the feature: https://bitwarden.com/help/emergency-access/

[-] CrabAndBroom@lemmy.ml 3 points 5 months ago

Looks like they need an account, and it's a paid feature.

Only premium users, including members of paid organizations (Families, Teams, or Enterprise) can designate trusted emergency contacts, however anyone with a Bitwarden account can be designated as a trusted emergency contact.

[-] MXX53@programming.dev 2 points 5 months ago

I use a Deadman switch I wrote myself. I have an encrypted vault that contains information that my wife/children may need to gain access to our health benefits, my life insurance policy info, my PII (code to my personal firesafe containing my SSN, birth cert, etc etc.), my bank account info, steps to file for debt forgiveness on my CCs (I pay a small amount per 100 dollars on my CCs that will wipe them if a supported life/death event happens), college tuition savings accounts for my kids and more.

Basically my goal is to make sure that my family has access to all of our assets and money since I manage our finances, and they have enough Info to change any accounts over to their email and info. I haven't told them yet but I have been stashing money as well (both in physical cash and a max contribution Roth IRA). If I ever die, I try and keep enough money in cash that no one knows about that will pay for all of their living expenses for a minimum 1 year. Since I do all of the budgeting, I can account for this before the spendable money is made aware to everyone. They would probably hate me now since we run pretty tight on money, but if I ever die I think they'll forgive me.

this post was submitted on 07 Jun 2024

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