Bitcoin Forum

No one wishes for calamity nor is any wishing to die young but we leave in world where death could come at any point. What will happen to your portfolios the numerous coins in your wallet. The XRPs, the doge, the Shiba Inu and the noble Bitcoin in that wallet will it go into the network without accessibility. 

Imagine after gathering all the coins you can afford to gather and no one can access your wallet should in case something terrible occurs will the investment still worth all the time and effort devoted to acquire them?

Let's assume for a second that I'm one of those users that "only" see BTCitcoin as an investment asset ^{[FYI, I'm not]}, I would probably prepare and leave enough clues ^{[as soon as I started to invest]} for my family members so they could easily retrieve and use those investments.

The answer to that depends on the reason behind starting that journey ^{[in most cases, it'll be "NO"]}.

If you don't leave your tutorial to your wife/ husband/ children on how they retrieve the coins you have, those coins will be lost forever. If you store them on exchanges, they will get it. If your account is inactive for too long (6 months or years, depend on exchange's terms of service), they will take over your coin.

So if you worry about that, about the death, let's give your tutorial to people you believe in and want to give them inheritance just in case you pass away.

to answer your title, none. I write notes, passwords, seed phrase, etc... that I think is important. if ever I suddenly die, I am pretty sure my relatives(my siblings in particular) knows where to look, they know me pretty well. since they know about cryptocurrency they will understand that is written in my notebook(I know it's not pretty high tech but it does do a good job on what it is supposed to do).

You should have your own strategy for such situations. I personally am lucky enough to have a family member with at least some idea on how bitcoin and cryptocurrency wallets work. So with enough information on how to unlock my wallets, that family member should be capable enough to retrieve the funds. I have the clues written on my personal safe, which I assume my family would try to forcefully open if it's the case that I pass on earlier than expected.

How you're going to do it will completely depend from person to person though. If you don't have a trusted family member with crypto knowledge, you might need to write down a really specific set of instructions.

Isn't this risky?
Someone may just break into your house and break out that safe. A safe is something which attracts a lot of attention of bandits..

Personally,  I have handled over a copy of my main wallet seed to a trusted family member which will be able to retrieve my btc in case I suddenly die in an accident.  I believe this is very important.

It's risky if you just straight off have the raw words written down, with the exact instructions on how to extract the funds. Hence why I only have 'clues' on my safe; basically which consists of some things that only me and the said person can understand. Not sure how to describe it clearly, but it's pretty much like when you and a really close friend has an inside joke that only the two of you can understand. My 'clue' is designed to be understood by the said person, and the said person only.

Now that I'm thinking about it though, we could both die in a car crash together and my funds would simply be gone. Probably need to re-think this lol.

This question has been asked and subsequently discussed a couple of times already on the forum, and this thread may not get the number of responses you desire, thus if you really want to understand the measures a lot of forum users have and will most likely put in place as regards this, then see this thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5284824.msg55464956#msg55464956
In my opinion, Bitcoin must not be used as an inheritance, neither must it be passed down, I'm not saying it's a bad idea for your loved ones to get your funds if you suddenly die, but most people have already kept quite a lot of things (in their will for example) for their loved ones to claim when they are gone, thus if they try to protect their Bitcoin funds as a result of the nature of the network, and they not being sure how their loved one would prolly handle their private info if they in any way give it to them, then if they die suddenly, I don't think they made a bad choice.

I was thinking of this lately, but then I remembered that I told one of my family member that I written something in a paper in my work desk and I just told them that they should not touch it at any point as it contains something "critical".
If one day that something terrible happens to me, I noted it that they can use the coins and just follow the instruction. I provided a link for them to learn the basic of how to move that coin around in case that they needed it.

Well, mine I just let them know about my password and they can open my PC and decrypt my files including my seed phrase using that password.
They already memorized the password so it won't be a problem in the future if there is something happen to me.

The best thing is they already know about Bitcoin and crypto and my two sons know how to withdraw their crypto into fiat. They actually playing NFT games and I already teach them how to withdraw them and make them real money. I'm lucky that my whole family can be trusted with my wallet but I always remind them that they can only access my PC when I'm gone.

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How about the other people who don't have a family?

Do you think they will still need to share their own secret with unknown people?
So I guess they won't.

So for now we should keep enjoying our life and crypto while we are alive until we found someone who can be trusted about our assets.

I've just told them, 'with this piece of paper, this is the key when I die'.

And then, I don't know if they have taken that seriously and they still have no knowledge about wallets and seed phrases but they know bitcoin, cryptocurrencies but I think they understood what I mean.

Thus, you need someone you really trust to be able to access your personal wallet when something unexpected happens.
If the assets that you keep have a large enough value, then you need to make a good plan to give inheritance rights or access to someone.

Store in a secure private wallet that is not connected to the internet. Do not store all assets in third party exchanges, because you do not have full control.

Make sure again that you have the correct private key and it is stored in the most secure place and can be accessed by you and the people you trust, don't let it be lost or known to the public.

Actually, questions like this have often been discussed, you can see them by searching in the search feature.

I have already gave instructions to my parents in such gloomy case.
I believe the important thing it is to store the seed where your relatives can find it and be sure they won't fall for a random scammer on the internet telling them:

1 Am s0rrY for Ur l0ss, Sir. AlSo 1'm a PaRt Of BiTcOiN TeCh SuPPoRt 1 cAn HelP If u giMME thE SeeDs sir.

One needs to be clear that the seed it is literally the money and whoever has the seed have the control.

What is important for me personally is that no one has access to my seed/private keys as long as I am alive and aware of the things around me, because in that way I prevent any risk that someone will use it and steal everything I have. Let’s put aside family ties and mutual trust, when it comes to big money most people have a completely blurred judgment and do things they wouldn’t otherwise do.

And what about people who have no one close to them, or are they surrounded by people who do not deserve any inheritance? In that case, it is better to take the secret to the grave than for some people to enjoy something they did not deserve - because who else loves leeches and parasites who do nothing in life and take advantage of others?

You don't have to give them your passphrase/seed/private keys. You only need to make them learn some stuff, like how Bitcoin wallets work etc; you should just sign a transaction which spends all of your money (you want to inherit) to a freshly generated address which will be owned by your family/loved one.

Just make it spendable after a certain block and ta-da! Trustless inheritance.

Thats a bit technical I think, but the idea is great and cool. Im thinking also the situation on how could I let my family knew how to recover my asset in anycase something happened to me. I know its a bad thing to assume that something like thay could happened but in any case I like some suggestion I read now it gives me such clues what should I do.

Bold of you to assume I hold those shitcoins  8)


Maybe my relatives will be able to access my crypto exchange accounts since I did KYC there and in the future there might be laws that will help with accessing such accounts in these cases, just like relatives can claim bank accounts in case of death. Right now the amount held in exchanges in really small, but who knows how much it will be in the future.

As for wallets, right now I store my seeds without any encryption, so if they go through my stuff and don't screw up the recovery process by installing a fake wallet, they might be able to claim all my coins.

I think this topic has treated  here in different ways, shall any ways, any question deserve an opinion or an answer, your point is what really make us human being on Earth, it's obvious that passphrase or password of anyone using bitcoin is is very important and is the highest key for security purposes, actually someone can die anyday and any hour without anybody having access to penetrate into his wallet due to the passphrase is not review to anyone, so the investment can be of waste without the passphrase to penetrate, so its very encouraging that any wallet password should be written down as a proper document or in forms of landed properties documents should in case of death and siblings or wife or husband can have access to the wallet, because it's very clear that death is unpredictable and unsecured.

No one has my phrase but I do have backup of my wallet which I've stored it and my family can access it after gathering certain information to open my wallet. More like a treasure hunting, your family member will only know your wallet once you told them that you gave hidden wallet info or leave a clue for them to discover. Before that will happen, first thing is that you should teach them about crypto.

At the very least, I have to tell the people who are closest to me and who have always loved me, from passwords to withdrawals, as well as the exchange sites I own, it should be done, there is nothing to hide from someone who always loves us in this life.

Of course what you say is true, everyone will experience death, someone should probably know what we keep or we have.

Crypto is also an asset in the form of digital money, almost the same as the paper money we have, gold, money in the bank that we tell our families, crypto, why not, don't you think so.

This is what I have been thinking nowadays in case something happens bad to me in an instant like an accident. Ain’t gonna invest in a safe box lol. I would rather give them some clues for them to inherit my seed phrases, private keys, etc., for non-custodial wallets.

Death is inevitable. it will come for all man. remember to spend time with friends and family. and also learn how to share some of your financial details with your family. incase you are gone. they might find it very easy to give you a grand finale.  :D :D. Also remember to talk to your creator and never act like the rich fool in the bible. it is a good ting to reflect on that one day, we will all die.

Your family would benefit from your investments if it's a success investment if wvwr something bad happens to you. I think for custodial wallet is that your family can claim funds by providing personal details that they are your family if I remember correctly. This has been discussed on Bitcoin discussion board. There is a medium link about a solution if ever something bad happen. This was found by mk4 https://medium.com/@pamelawjd/letter-to-loved-ones-a-template-for-your-crypto-estate-planning-4ee0975434e4.

The title should be "Who else has your seed phrase?"

No one can access your fund with your passphrase.
In the case you are talking about the series of words used for recovering a wallet, that's called seed phrase (or mnemonic phrase), not passphrase.

If you have added a passphrase to your seed phrase, then you need both seed phrase and the passphrase.

Right now, only I know the passphrase of my wallets. In case that I might leave this world, I'll gonna note everything even the steps on how to access my wallets if ever they found that note so my assets can still be used by them. Of course, it will be gonna a waste of time and effort if no one will get my money so better ready a note that probably gonna help them to access those wallets and of course, it should be given to your family only or people that you trust.

Almost everyone probably already thought about that. That's why we should give some hints or maybe if you really trust those who are very closed to you, you could give it to him/her so if every something happened to you, the funds will not go into void where no one can access it.
I myself, I'm planning to give all of my seed phrases to my partner, so if ever something happened to me, it can be used.

I once thought about this same question because lots of people are dead now and they are having coins in their wallet but since they are dead the coin in the wallet is completely useless because nobody knows about their private key which is very bad, I believe if you are creating a wallet you should always back it up in your diary which even after your death your family will definitely check your dairy and they will see your private key and they can make use of it instead of your coin to be useless in your wallet.

Right now the one who knows seed phrases/private keys of my wallet is just myself. I had written everything in an ordinary note but did not have a plan to inherit it to the people around me yet, maybe someday I would give clues on how to use it to them if the time has come. ::)

If you die now or die tomorrow trust your family will not have access to your seed phrase or wallet because we all are so secretive not letting anybody know that we have a coin in our wallet that be a source of income. Some of us hide this to escape family members asking us for unnecessary money ww will not like to give.
If you disclose your seed phrase to your family, they can terminate you and do away with the funds making it a risky thought.

Well, I'm still bent on keeping my keys in myself. Not because accidents or calamities will notify me before anything but, I just have a sense of hope and belive that nothing is going to happen anytime soon. Haven't really thought of it but then, my keys are silently stored away while, I plan a way, the best way of putting it out in the event of a disaster.
There is no way my coin would be lost, its a possibility but, one that I'm not going to let happen. It must be passed on maybe in a while of certain directives or maybe in a puzzle that could be accessed for clues when I'm no more or maybe too aged to really go about my crypto investments then, I would put it out along with other directives.

I'm a living witness of such a frustrating scenario. Early this year I misplaced the passphrase to my Trust Wallet. I didn't know that I didn't have the passphrase again (can't really explain how I lost it till today) until my phone packed up and I needed to reinstal it. I reinstalled it but couldn't log in again. I searched for my seedphrase but couldn't find it, even till date. I see the cryptos I have there whenever I check my address on bsc explorer. But of what use is it if I can see my assets but can't withdraw it. Though I know the case at hand is slightly different from what I passed through; of one not revealing one's passphrase to anyone before their untimely death, both events meet at the same junction of the owner or anyone not being able to assess what is in that wallet. I'm like the biblical Moses, seeing the assets in my wallet but can't withdraw anything.