Nobody knows how long cryptocurrencies will live, but most likely they will outlive us all. Transferring digital assets to loved ones after your death is not as straightforward as transferring cash or property through a will. However, a will is not suitable for conveying confidential information.
Since only a private key is required to withdraw money from your wallet, it is unlikely that anyone would think of putting it in the text of the will.
“I would strongly recommend not putting private information in your will,” said family law attorney Gordon Fisher. “After your death, a will becomes a court document that can be viewed by anyone..”
A private key is an immutable password that is generated when creating a cryptocurrency wallet. It should be stored in as safe and secure a place as possible.
Although the will may not immediately become publicly available, it is still unwise to leave the keys to the wallet somewhere. Your family may not immediately understand the importance of the private key, and by the time they do, the digital funds will have already been stolen. Fisher notes that, unlike wills, trusts “are typically private documents.”
Many cryptocurrency platforms do not allow their users to name beneficiaries, but there are others.
The largest marketplace Coinbase has made it possible for heirs to claim the assets left by the deceased (hopefully your family knows which exchange you are using).
But the popular application Robinhood, which offers cryptocurrency trading services, does not give its clients the opportunity to name beneficiaries. And in this case, the process of proving rights to assets by heirs can quickly turn into a protracted legal nightmare.
It is still not known how many tokens were irretrievably lost as a result of the fact that people did not have time to transfer them to their relatives. Experts say a variety of reasons have led to the loss of between 2.3 million and 3.7 million bitcoins, or $15 to $24 billion at current prices.
And while cryptocurrencies are often touted as a means to financial independence, the difficulty of transferring it after death demonstrates that we must trust each other.
Currently there is no solution to the issue of inheritance rights to crypto assets.. Most jurisdictions, when it comes to death, transfer the assets of the deceased to his family. However, crypto information is not configured for this type of transfer by default. Precautions when storing crypto assets, wallet passwords and key phrases are known only to the users themselves. If they were not announced to the heirs in advance, then it is almost impossible to gain access to the digital assets of the deceased.
Just remember that a person suddenly dies in order to be able to transfer some bitcoins from the next world to his family.
According to qz.com
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