Digital Ending

Today most people have digital lives. About 24% (about 1.75 bn) of the world has smart phones and 40% (2.94 bn) use the internet. Facebook has over 1.3 bn users. With this kind of human digital and virtual existence, there is a need for synchronization of end of life (EOL) for physical and digital deaths.

With this in view Yahoo has introduced in Japan a new Ending service which was announced last week. This unique service is being offered to solve the problems being faced by all families connected to the internet across the world who lack the IDs and passwords or legal authority required to close down the Facebook or other online accounts of relatives who have died. This EOL service will delete the users’ Yahoo accounts after their deaths, along with the documents, photos and videos from their Yahoo Box online storage accounts and cancel subscription services under Yahoo Wallet. 

With such an overwhelming use of web accounts such as email, social networking, cloud storage, chat rooms, newsletters, ezines, forums, blogs, online banking and financial accounts and transactions, health data, accounts with utility providers, mobile services, etc, there is definitely a dire need for a comprehensive EOL service which can cater to all web service providers.

With the proliferation of the internet and the increasing pervasiveness of digital life, most of the digirati like us have dozens of IDs and passwords for the various services listed in the previous para. Apart from this, there is an issue of dormant IDs and multiple IDs belonging to single person under pseudonyms. Though there are opening dates of these accounts, there are no expiries or closing dates.

For most of us, our spouses, relatives or close friends are not privy to those IDs and passwords. In each of the email and chat type of internet services, we have multiple groups of friends and contacts in sets, sub-sets with various degrees of overlaps. Hence after EOL, there is no one to inform these various virtual groups of the EOLs.

A lot of personal information has been also submitted / stored in these websites / servers. Apart from this, most of the contacts in various services may not be aware of the EOL of the person. There a possibility of misuse of the late person’s web accounts, banking and financial accounts by hackers, etc.

In view of all the above, there is certainly a need for a comprehensive EOL web service (EOLWS) which will after the death of a person inform all the web services of the person of the demise so that all the accounts’ services are suspended and data frozen. This EOLWS should during the lifetime of the dead person taken information from him/her about his/her nominee / legal heirs, along with a list of all IDs and passwords. This should be taken with the legal assurance that they will be used only after the person’s death for specified purposes like closing / deleting the accounts, freezing / deleting data, informing all the contacts in the respective services in coordination with each service provider about the EOL of the person.

There are lots of other linkages which such an EOLWS can have like social security number, passport details, driving license, PAN, UID, etc. EOL certificate from the doctor or Government can also be linked and used as a cross check on the person’s EOL.

Some of the other services this EOLWS can also provide in due course are:

1.    Online condolences

2.    Online funerals / memorials for all contacts

3.    Photos of the person, family, etc

4.    Friends, relatives can contribute photos, write-ups

5.    Death anniversaries

6.    Even during the life of the person, if they become critically ill the news can be circulated to all contacts.

The options for such an EOLWS provider are truly endless. With increasing penetration of the internet and digitalization of our existences, our deaths should also be recorded comprehensively in the virtual world. Indeed we are hurtling to an era of life and death on the digital highway.