Passwords and a Will: What Not to Do

Once someone dies and their executor applies for probate (or letters of administration if there is no will), the will itself becomes a matter of public record. Anyone at all can request a copy from the Probate Registry, usually for a small fee, and there is no vetting of who is asking or why.

This means any password, PIN, security question answer, or other sensitive access detail written directly into your will is effectively published to the world at exactly the point in time it might still be useful to a fraudster, since accounts are often left unattended and unmonitored for some time after a death. It is precisely the wrong place to keep this kind of information.

Instead, keep a separate document, updated regularly, listing your important digital accounts (email, banking, social media, subscriptions, cloud storage) and how to access them, or at least enough information for your executor to know an account exists and start the process of accessing or closing it. This document should be kept somewhere secure and private, not filed alongside your will.

Options include a physical document kept in a safe or with a trusted person, a secure digital file, or a dedicated password manager. Whichever method you choose, tell your executor, or a trusted family member, that it exists and roughly where to find it, without revealing the actual contents until it is needed.

Your will itself can simply note that you maintain a separate record of digital account information and instruct your executor to locate it through a nominated trusted person or storage method, without ever quoting a single password or security detail within the will's own text.

This keeps the will focused on what it is meant to do, direct legally binding instructions about your estate, while making sure your executor knows the practical information exists and where the trail begins.

Many password managers now offer an emergency access or legacy contact feature, allowing a nominated person to request access to your stored passwords after a waiting period, sometimes with additional verification. This can be a genuinely practical modern solution, since it keeps everything centrally organised and updates automatically as you change passwords, unlike a static written list that quickly goes out of date.

If you use this kind of feature, make sure your executor or nominated contact knows it exists and understands roughly how the request and waiting period process works, so there are no surprises when the time comes.

Even with the right password, access to a deceased person's account is not guaranteed, since many providers, including major email, social media and financial platforms, have their own terms of service and formal processes for dealing with a deceased user's account, sometimes requiring a death certificate or grant of probate rather than simply a password.

Our guides on digital assets and wills and online accounts after death cover how different types of platform typically handle this, and our digital legacy checklist sets out a practical list of accounts and information worth recording for your executor.