Digital Inheritance

The data you leave on social media needs to be managed after your death.

- Kezia Talbot and Remay De Kock

We are living in a time where technology is at the heart of our existence. Social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram dictate and fill our lives on a daily basis. We spend so much energy on these sites – posting photos, writing about experiences and blogging – that it makes sense to leave instructions on the manner in which you would like these digital assets to be handled after your death.

Online planning service Everplans describes digital assets as follows: “Digital property (or digital assets) can be understood as any information about you or created by you that exists in digital form, either online or on an electronic storage device, including the information necessary to access the digital asset. All of your digital property comprises what is known as your digital estate.” 

The questions are: how do you want your legacy to live on in the social media world and what would you like to happen to your digital assets? Regardless of your answers to these questions, the solution to ensuring that your wishes are carried out is a Social Media and Digital Assets Will (SMDAW). There are two parts to this document. The first deals with what you would like to happen to your social media legacy and content, and the second deals with your data stored on cloud servers and your own hardware.