Click here to view original web page at Giving up the ghost online and what it means to you
A GHOST tour in Edinburgh was where I first discovered the morbid truth about why Victorian headstones often had bells attached.
Buried by mistake? Ring urgently for service.
We’ve come a long way since then, and thanks to modern medicine can be certain when someone’s been ‘called home’ before doing the needful.
If you’re squirming a bit in your seat at the thought, it’s natural. The D word is nobody’s favourite and talking about it is the biggest slap in the face to any healthy dose of self-denial about what’s at the ‘end of the line’.
Anyway, let’s say you are doing a bit of planning and you’ve sorted out what to wear, who to invite and all that, then as a child of the Digital Age you must also put on your ‘to do’ list who can access your social media accounts and other digital assets when you’re gone.
Apparently it’s a bit of a grey area in legal circles and they want to do something about it.
At the helm is the NSW Law Reform Commission which his reviewing laws affecting life beyond your digital death.
Initially they’ve called for submissions from the legal profession and later in the year the public can throw in their two cents worth (and for those born after 1992, when the two-cent coin was demonetised, it means your opinion).
When making the review public, Attorney General Mark Speakman said: “In today’s hyper-connected world, an unprecedented amount of work and socialising occurs online, yet few of us consider what happens to our digital assets once we’re gone or are no longer able to make decisions.
“This is leading to confusion and complexity as family, friends and lawyers are left to untangle digital asset ownership issues, applying laws that were developed long before the arrival of email, blogs, social media and cryptocurrency.”
What the LRC is more worried about is who can access your digital stuff, but although it’s inappropriate to laugh at a time like this, this quote from Speakman was just a little bit ironic.
He said: “When a loved one passes away, bureaucratic hurdles and legal uncertainty are the last thing families and friends feel like confronting, so we need clear and fair laws to deal with these 21st Century problems.”
Bureaucratic hurdles and legal uncertainty are what families and friends are confronted with when a loved one passes away.
I suppose we’ve really only got ourselves to blame, being the most connected of all countries in the world. So, the review will focus on NSW, Commonwealth and international laws, including those relating to intellectual property, privacy, contract, crime, estate administration, wills, succession and assisted-decision making.
The LRC will scrutinise (their words, sounds expensive) the policies and terms of service agreements of social media companies and other digital service providers.
Facebook is at a bit of an advantage here already, having had lots of experience in this area.
On a more serious note, social media companies do handle sites of the deceased differently, from memorialising them to simply shutting them down.
Having a say in what you’d like to happen, particularly given there can be a story of a whole life recorded there, is important.
If you haven’t made arrangements for anyone to take control of your sites or access private emails, the LRC is considering whether additional privacy protections are needed.
The issue of ownership of digital assets upon death cuts across many different areas of law which is why it’s not clear and fair but complicated.
Here I was thinking I’d just leave a list of my 70,000 passwords for someone else to troll through my social media, blogs and websites if they could actually be bothered.
But really, who could forgo the opportunity to plan ahead by scheduling posts and memes to appear long after I’m gone, saying things like ‘I can see what you’re doing’ or ‘There is no Planet-B’.
Visit www.lawreform.justice.nsw.gov.au to read more.
