Posthumous E-mail
I’m sure most of you have heard about the father of the Marine who is trying to gain access to his son’s Yahoo! e-mail account. It does tug at the heartstrings, and there are plenty of opinions; I’ll admit my gut reaction upon first hearing this on Monday was, well, why not? Let the family have access to the e-mail…what could it hurt?
But then reality set in, and it occurred to me that the e-mail might be considered akin to a safe-deposit box, or even a bank account. For instance, if I were to pass away, my parents wouldn’t be able to access my bank account, unless I had stated such in my will. That’s the whole point of having a will: it allows you to determine who gets what, and in this age of computers/passwords/e-mail, who gets access to what. If I wanted my father to have access to my e-mail, I probably would give him the password now, or be very explicit in my will. What’s unusual in this situation is that death in the age of the internet & e-mail has not yet been fully analyzed & thought out; this sad story will likely get many people thinking about what to do “in case of…” While my heart goes out to the parents of the Marine, I don’t think that Yahoo! will allow them access, nor should it.
December 28th, 2004 at 8:59 pm
Very thought provoking. The only reason I would want access to a deceased loved one’s email accounts would be to notify their correspondents. Same would be true for access to my accounts; although, Hubby already has access to mine. I mean, how else could he let you know if something were to happen to me? I’m not sure I intentionally planned it this way. Plans are a good thing and something for us all to consider.
December 28th, 2004 at 9:04 pm
Not without a court order. It seems the parents may have a compelling need to see what is in the inbox, however a showing of such may have to be properly presented to a judge.
December 28th, 2004 at 11:39 pm
If the deceased Marine had a will, the named executor will marshall all his assets (including his Yahoo account) and distribute them as directed in the will. If the deceased Marine had no will and did not leave a surviving spouse or children, then under most, if not all, states’ law (and the Uniform Probate Code), his assets, which include his Yahoo account, will pass to his parents. They need only go to surrogate’s office (as does everyone in similar circumstances) and receive Letters of Administration, which can then be forwarded to Yahoo to obtain access to the account.
December 29th, 2004 at 1:18 pm
Problem is that the Yahoo account expires after a certain time, which will *poof* probably before probate is done (not probably, knowing what little I do about how long probate takes). As I understand it, the father was working hard to get access before the alloted time ran out.
In any event, I’m thinking that the best course of action is: take care of this sort of thing BEFORE you kick — and have a good Will. Which is good advice, period.