In Jupiter, we know that legacy means more than beachfront property and brokerage accounts. Today, your wealth and your identity live online. Your iPhone is a vault of memories, your crypto wallet is a treasury, and your cloud accounts are the modern equivalent of the family safe. Yet few Floridians realize that if they passed away tomorrow, their heirs might never access those digital treasures.

At Welch Law, PLLC, we see this every week: families locked out of loved ones’ financial accounts, crypto exchanges refusing to cooperate, photos lost forever in the cloud. It’s a heartbreaking, avoidable mess. The solution? A Digital Asset Estate Plan.

Below is the ultimate Florida-specific checklist to protect your digital legacy, and give your loved ones peace of mind.

1. Appoint a Digital Executor—Because Your Passwords Won’t Speak for You

Traditional wills deal with tangible assets: homes, cars, jewelry. But what about your Coinbase wallet, Instagram account, or Gmail inbox? Under Florida law, your executor has no automatic right to access your digital accounts unless you’ve granted that authority in your estate plan.

That’s where the Digital Executor comes in; a person legally empowered to handle your online footprint. Florida has adopted the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act (RUFADAA), which allows executors and trustees to access digital assets only if you’ve explicitly authorized them.

At Welch Law, we draft this language into your Last Will and Testament or Revocable Living Trust, ensuring your fiduciaries can manage crypto holdings, online subscriptions, and cloud-based files when you’re gone.

Florida Example: A client in Jupiter owned Bitcoin stored in a Ledger device. Without instructions in his trust, his family would never have found the seed phrase. Instead, his Welch Crypto Trust™ ensured secure access, transferring his crypto portfolio seamlessly to his heirs.

2. Use a Password Manager That Allows Family Access

Managing hundreds of accounts:  banking, Netflix, Amazon, crypto, insurance, can feel like juggling beach balls in a hurricane. A secure password manager like 1Password, Bitwarden, or Dashlane consolidates them in one encrypted vault.  NEVER, AND I MEAN NEVER, INPUT YOUR SEED PHRASES INTO THESE MANAGERS!!!

The key is choosing one with Family Sharing features. This allows you to grant emergency access to a spouse or digital executor. They won’t see your private data during your lifetime, but if you’re incapacitated or pass away, they can unlock critical accounts.

Imagine your family trying to log into your Fidelity or Schwab account without your password. Now imagine them finding it instantly through a shared vault. That’s peace of mind in action.

3. Document Every Digital Asset—Even the Ones You Forget Exist

Your online presence is vast, bigger than you realize. We advise our clients to create a Digital Asset Inventory, listing every account that holds value or information:

• Financial: Online banking, PayPal, Venmo, crypto wallets, stock trading platforms.

• Personal: Email accounts, photo libraries, cloud drives.

• Subscriptions: Streaming, news, fitness, shopping, and storage.

• Business: Domain names, Shopify, Etsy, eBay, and merchant accounts.

• Health: Patient portals, insurance dashboards, and fitness apps.

If you’ve ever spent a Saturday resetting forgotten passwords, imagine your family doing it in grief. Don’t make them guess—make them a roadmap.

4. Enable Legacy Contacts on Major Platforms

The biggest tech companies are finally catching up to estate planning. Many now offer built-in digital legacy tools that allow you to pre-authorize who can access your data after your death:

• Apple → Legacy Contact lets you name someone to access photos, notes, and iCloud data.

• Google → Inactive Account Manager allows you to decide who gets access after inactivity.

• Facebook/Instagram → Memorialization settings let loved ones manage or close your profile.

These features vary by platform, and not every company has them. Your estate planning attorney should ensure your will or trust explicitly grants your executor authority under RUFADAA to manage accounts that lack built-in tools.

Real-World Example: A Palm Beach Gardens widow couldn’t close her late husband’s Facebook profile for over a year because no legacy contact was set. Once she updated her own accounts and will, she told us, “That’s one thing my kids will never have to struggle with.”

5. Set Up Account Recovery Contacts

We’ve all been locked out of accounts before. But when the person who knows the password is gone, recovery becomes a nightmare.

Apple now allows you to name Account Recovery Contacts—trusted individuals who can receive verification codes and unlock your Apple ID if needed. Many password managers, like 1Password Family, also allow account recovery through a designated organizer.

For those managing cryptocurrency or NFTs, this is mission-critical. If your seed phrase or private key is lost, your assets are gone forever. A Welch Crypto Trust™ can safely record and transmit these keys under strict (airgapped) legal safeguards, something Florida law recognizes as personal property capable of trust transfer.

6. Store Vital Documents in Secure, Shareable Cloud Folders

Not every file belongs in a fireproof safe. Today, many of our clients use encrypted cloud platforms—Google Drive, Dropbox, or iCloud Drive—to store scanned copies of their estate plan, deeds, life insurance policies, and tax returns.

When properly set up, these platforms allow restricted access for family or advisors. That means your spouse can retrieve your healthcare directives if you’re hospitalized, or your CPA can access tax records after your passing.

However, privacy laws limit ownership transfers, so each provider’s deceased user policy must be reviewed. At Welch Law, we often draft a Digital Asset Authorization Letter that complements your trust, allowing heirs to request data or account closure.

7. Create an Emergency Information Sheet

This is the document that saves your family days—or weeks—of chaos. It should include:

• Primary email addresses

• Bank and investment account info (without full account numbers)

• Insurance and mortgage contacts

• Password manager master login

• Contact information for your estate planning attorney, CPA, and financial advisor

• Location of your original will, trust, and healthcare directives

We recommend storing this in two places: a home safe and a secure copy with your attorney. If you’re a Welch Law client, we can integrate it into your Digital Asset Schedule, a proprietary addendum to your estate plan that organizes this data.

8. Review Every Six Months—Because the Digital World Moves Fast

Estate plans used to last five or ten years before needing updates. In the digital age, that timeline is fantasy. Your accounts change constantly. Passwords update. Platforms disappear.

That’s why Welch Law advises a semiannual digital review. Every six months, you, or your digital executor, should:

• Update your password manager

• Refresh your emergency sheet

• Verify crypto storage and access

• Review your will or trust for any digital additions

• Test account recovery settings

Florida law doesn’t require this frequency—but experience does. The pace of change online is relentless. If your estate plan isn’t keeping up, it’s falling behind.

9. Protecting Cryptocurrency and NFTs—The New Frontier

Digital currency isn’t just investment, it’s inheritance. Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana holdings can be worth millions, but without access credentials, those assets vanish into the blockchain ether.

Our Welch Crypto Trust™ is Florida’s first purpose-built digital trust for crypto investors. It integrates seamlessly with your estate plan, allowing you to store seed phrases, private keys, and multi-signature wallet details legally and securely.

Whether you’re a Bitcoin maximalist or just getting started on Kraken, if you own crypto, it belongs in your estate plan—period.

10. The Emotional Payoff: Control, Confidence, and Legacy

It’s easy to postpone digital housekeeping. But once you’ve completed this checklist, something happens, you feel lighter. You’ve turned digital chaos into clarity. You’ve given your loved ones a gift far greater than money: certainty.

Your online life, organized. Your crypto, protected. Your family, empowered.

At Welch Law, we don’t just plan estates. We protect legacies in every form they take, from beachfront condos to Bitcoin wallets.

By:  Edward J. Welch, Esq. ||| Estate Planning | Wills | Trusts | Asset Protection | Welch Crypto Trust™

If you would like to discuss your legacy options with an estate planning attorney in Jupiter or Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, schedule a complimentary call with Edward J. Welch at Welch Law, PLLC.  At Welch Law, WE WANT TO DRAFT YOUR LEGACY!

Reference: technobezz (September 22, 2025) “9 Tech Steps to Take Before You Die (So Your Family Doesn’t Have To”