Plans for Our Digital Assets
Part One:
Most of us know we should keep our important documents in order, but very few of us stop to think about our digital life in the same way. A recent article from Downie Stewart Lawyers outlined something many New Zealanders are quietly experiencing. Our digital assets now make up a huge part of our lives, yet most estate plans barely touch them.
Digital assets are no longer just bank accounts or property records. They include internet banking platforms, online investment accounts, digital wallets, cloud stored photos and videos, email archives, social media, business tools, domain names and everything we use to run our personal and professional lives. These are often where our memories sit, where our identity lives and where our financial records are held.
The legal commentary makes one thing very clear. Most wills in New Zealand still focus on traditional assets, which means that digital accounts are often overlooked. When that happens, families can be locked out. Passwords cannot be retrieved. Crypto keys disappear. Photos stored in the cloud may be permanently lost. Executors can spend months trying to navigate unclear access rules across different platforms.
There is also a legal grey zone. New Zealand law does not yet provide detailed guidance about who has the right to access a person’s digital life once they die. This is similar around the world. The United Kingdom, Australia and the EU all acknowledge the same gap. Most countries are scrambling to update their laws because digital identity, digital assets and digital memories are now part of everyday life.
The Downie Stewart piece highlighted four practical things everyone should do:
Make a digital inventory (we know a place!)
Store login credentials securely (not in a will) (Holdmine is great for this)
Appoint someone who can manage or close your digital accounts (you can easily do this in Holdmine too, check out info on Trusted Contacts)
Record where private keys or hardware wallets are stored (there’s a whole section in Holdmine for exactly this and it’s super secure)
