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Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

thoughtscollected.tech

101–110 of 194 posts

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#101
post #91

It should be «christophercalm/when-im-gone», not «christophercalm/if-im-gone». That's not an option.

I would argue that it is an option. As of now the code block inside...

    if(christophercalm_is_gone) {
        follow_his_instructions();
    }
...will not execute.

On a more serious note though, on a social level, I think «if I'm gone» is much better phrasing than «when I'm gone» if the intention is to be prepared for unforeseen tragic events. Unless one is facing a terminal illness or is past a certain age, using when is too melodramatic, especially when the target audience are close loved ones. It doesn't only imply the inevitability of being gone some day, but also implies the certainty that ones current loved ones will have to face it and must know what to do.

I imagine that the author hopes to live to a ripe old age and probably outlive his "somewhat complex" home setup. In that regard, the if makes more sense, as it is nowhere near certain that anyone will have to deal with his home setup when he is gone.

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#102

A friend of a relative had their house burglarized over a weekend. The burglars took their time and took apart everything, cutting all pictures out of their frames, etc. If a written password existed, they would have found it. The "give it to an attorney" plan would also worry me, unless I knew exactly who/what/when/where/why/how access was controlled and GUARANTEED (after all, an attorney's system could break down a…

Ideally this should be stored at a safety deposit box in that case. There are certainly risks with having this information all in one place like you said.

Unfortunately safe deposit boxes aren't available everywhere - newly built banks often don't have them, and some banks that have them no longer accept new customers. --They're expensive to build and maintain, and they're seen as being in a somewhat grey area with regards to KYC laws.

Having a safe at home is an option, but it needs to be mounted properly to prevent a burglar from being able to simply carry it out and try and access later.

At the end of the day, your best bet is to keep instructions on accessing your data (minus the actual code that is needed) somewhere it can easily be found by your family, and make sure that one or more family members have copies of the code but don't know the full details of where to use it without those instructions.

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#103

Multiple printed copies of password manager's master password? Is he serious?

What else do you propose when trying to solve for this scenario? If all your passwords are within your password manager and you're suddenly incapacitated or dead, at some point a family members will need access. You can push people to use password managers themselves but sometimes that's just not going to happen, in particular if you're in a position where your next of kin might be older or just generally less techni…

Copy necessary data to a separate vault, at least. Don't put everything at risk.

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#104

A friend of a relative had their house burglarized over a weekend. The burglars took their time and took apart everything, cutting all pictures out of their frames, etc. If a written password existed, they would have found it. The "give it to an attorney" plan would also worry me, unless I knew exactly who/what/when/where/why/how access was controlled and GUARANTEED (after all, an attorney's system could break down a…

Just give the attorney a sealed printed list of 10,000 numbered passwords. Someone with the passwords won't know what they are for. Even if they can guess that one of them is for your email account and they know your email account, they'll have to try thousands of passwords before they find the right one.

In your house, and maybe with trusted friends, keep the instructions sheet with logins and a reference to the relevant password number. "To access my email account, username is foo@gmail.com and use password #5122 from the password list".

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#105
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read the help page. https://www.deadmansswitch.net/help/ How can I be sure you'll outlive me? We don't have to outlive you! If the service shuts down while you're alive, we'll send you an email well in advance so you can switch services. That said, the service has been running successfully since 2007.

If the owner of the website dies, the site may shut down due to not paying the bills.

For such case, if I were to use this service I would hope the owner's own dead man's switch has been set up properly.

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#106
Also consider setting a successor on GitHub:

> We recommend inviting another GitHub user to be your successor, to manage your user owned repositories if you cannot

https://docs.github.com/en/account-and-profile/setting-up-an...

The successor has only access to the public repositories after presenting a death certificate.

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#107

Also consider what happens if someone is incapacitated but not dead. Getting into email, bank, etc. is one thing, but what if you own property with someone who is suddenly and irreversibly brain damaged? I strongly recommend filing a lasting power of attorney in advance if your risk of this is non-negligible. My mother is living a nightmare due to it right now as she assumed being someone's spouse would let you take…

This is something you should bring up with your bank. In Finland if you have a joint account with your spouse there is a difference if the account is listed as "X and Y" vs "X or Y".

In the first case the account is inaccessible for a fair bit of time if either X or Y dies. In the latter case both can always access it.

My partner's aunt got hit by this when her husband was 100% incapacitated and hospitalized. She couldn't even pay her rent or buy groceries, because she couldn't prove her husband agreed with the spending.

We switched our account to the "or" style really fast after that.

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#108

BitWarden has an emergency access feature. https://bitwarden.com/help/emergency-access/ Essentially you grant another BitWarden user as an emergency access user. They can request access, and you have 7 days to decline access. After 7 days it grants them access to your vault.

Better not go for a 8 day off-grid adventure if you don't trust your emergency access user a 1000%

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#109
post #99

Keeping your money in the bank means the executor of your will can usually get it through a straightforward process. Keeping your money in crypto means that, by default, it dies with you, unless you take special effort to ensure otherwise, and are willing to trust a solution you can't possibly debug because you'll be dead.

What needs top be debugged? Leave instructions of how to access your seed words and they get full access to the funds in the wallet.

Re: Cheat sheet for if I'm gone

#110
I have a document covering all the basics of our tech stuff in the house in case I’ve died or are otherwise incapacitated. Everything from what our router is and how to use it to where our bitcoin is.

I put it together after my wife wrote a brief “if I’m dead here is what’s important to me” and I was reminded of a friend who passed several years ago and left his family in an awkward tech state because of his nerdy idiosyncrasies.

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