Memorialised accounts are a place for friends and family to gather and share memories after a person has passed away.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Who owns and can access your photos, music and social media account content when you die? There is an ever-increasing interest in how digital assets are dealt with on death.
DIGITAL ASSETS
Very many of us use digital and social media every day without giving much or any thought as to who actually owns the images and other information we upload and share. Very few of us probably bother to read all the deliberately very small print that goes with programmes and apps we use. Even if we did so, they have to be written in legal language that can be difficult for untrained people to understand, however intelligent they are.
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In recent years the law has tried to catch up with the constant developments and the companies who provide these services have started to provide more information to help bereaved people understand what action they need to take to delete or memorialise accounts. Some services now allow an account to be memorialised, which means it is preserved but who can post to it is limited. However the whole area is quite complex and getting in touch with services takes time especially as it usually has to be done on-line with companies usually based in other countries.
The links below will take you to the relevant pages for these popular social media channels
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Digital Memorials – it is possible to create a digital memorial for someone who has died.
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Much Loved https://www.muchloved.com/ is a charity which exists specifically for this purpose and also enables people to give on-line in memory of the person who has died.
Further reading on Digital Assets
The Gazette – Official Public Records website has the following guides for Protecting (and recovering) digital assets: online banking to bitcoins and What happens to digital assets on death