Entrustet, the leader in Digital Estate Planning, launches Digital Property reports to find online accounts of the recently deceased
Entrustet Digital Property reports allow families, attorneys and executors to quickly find digital property of the recently deceased. Entrustet’s service automatically scours the web and returns a report of a deceased person’s online accounts, along with step by step instructions on how to transfer and delete each account.
“Our partner attorneys kept coming to us asking us to help clients who did not protect their online accounts before they died,” said Jesse Davis, Entrustet’s CEO. “We created a simple service to help people find the decedent’s digital property.”
Survivors send Entrustet the deceased person’s email address(es) and Entrustet automatically scours over 50 of the most popular websites on the Internet to find online accounts. Entrustet sends the family a digital property report with specific step by step instructions from each company where the deceased had an account.
“We’ve already found hundreds of online accounts that would have otherwise been lost,” said co-founder Nathan Lustig. “We even found a business domain name that was going to expire in 30 days so that the family could renew it quickly.”
Attorneys receive unlimited monthly digital property searches when they partner with us, depending on the size of their firm. Plans start at $10 per month. Individuals can purchase single Digital Property Reports. Attorneys already see the value in Entrustet digital property searches.
“We’ve implemented digital property searches into our standard estate planning practice,” said Attorney Joseph W. Boucher. “It gives us piece of mind that we’re not missing anything in the probate process, plus our clients like to know that we’re being thourough.”
Attorney Jennifer Santini concurs. “My client was very impressed with Entrustet’s search,” says Jennifer Santini, “The search not only found valuable digital property that I might have not found, but it saved the personal representative and me time that we could devote to other probate matters. I found Entrustet’s company death policy resource useful when helping my clients decide how to delete, access or transfer each specific online account.”
For a free sample report or more information, please contact us directly at lawyers@entrustet.com.
For more information about Entrustet Digital Property Searches or Entrustet in general:
Phone: (608) 561-1441 Mail: Entrustet, 30 W. Mifflin St.
Suite 406B
Madison WI, 53703
Entrustet (www.entrustet.com) is the market leader in the emerging digital death industry. Entrustet allows people to make a plan for their digital assets with Account Guardian, which allows people to make a list of their digital assets and decide which are deleted and which are transferred to heirs. Entrustet also helps those who did not create a plan by doing an automated Digital Property Search. Other Entrustet services include a lawyer directory, corporate partner program, account incinerator and digital executor toolbox.
Jesse and I were interviewed for a video for the Start-Up Chile blog. We talked about why we liked being in Chile, how the program has helped our business and our thoughts on why we’re entrepreneurs. Check out the video:
Attorney Ken Strutin wrote a great summary of what happens to your digital life after you pass away in the New York Law Journal. He gives an overview of digital assets and some of the relevant caselaw, including Oklahoma’s recent law that allows executors access to decesaed people’s digital assets.
Strutin also talks about ways that people can start to protect themselves while they are still alive. He mentions digital afterlife services, inclusion in wills and trusts and other helpful tips to create a plan before you pass away. From the link:
Still, one of the neglected ensigns of internet citizenship is advanced planning. When people die, there are virtual secrets that follow them to the grave — the last refuge of privacy in a transparent society. Courts and legislatures have only begun to reckon with the disposition of digital assets when no one is left with the knowledge or authority to conclude the business of the cyber-afterlife.
For the price of an e-mail address and a uniquely crafted password, anyone can become vested in the online world. Cloud computing and web-based data transactions offer access to a variety of host sites, whether a bank, a credit card company, a vendor, an online auction house, or a social networking site. These are the tools of our time, and every generation from now on will be leaving well-concealed digital tracks. Therefore, the most important long-term consideration is who can access a person’s online life after they have gone or become incapacitated?
This article is more suited for the attorney audience and is a welcome addition to the conversation. Make sure to check it out to learn more about digital estate planning and all of the issues surrounding what happens to your online presence when you pass away.
I had the privilege of discussing Entrustet and the issues surrounding digital assets and death on KQED San Francisco’s radio show Forum alongside New York Times columnist Rob Walker and host Scott Schaefer. You can listen to the hour long discussion below:
It was a great experience and I thoroughly enjoyed talking about the issues, especially those raised by the callers. I also had the chance to write up some answers to a few of the questions we got yesterday. Check it out and feel free to ask any more questions you might have.
We just put up our partners page that includes the law firms we’ve partnered with, along with all of the websites who’ve agreed to allow their users to transfer or delete their online accounts when they die. So far, we’ve got Flavors.me, Goodsie, Groupstory, Broadjam and Vendder on the website side and over 20 law firms from across the United States who now know what to do with their clients’ digital assets when they want to protect them in their wills and trusts.
We’ve also partnered with Funeral Resources, one of the leading web communities for information about funerals.
