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A Step-by-Step Guide to an Effective Digital Estate Planning

glitchbusters on August 16, 2023

In our previous blog, we began talking about the digital assets of a business—what they are, why they are vital to the business, and how to protect them. We have also mentioned how important it is to protect them even after you, the business owner, have passed away, through effective digital estate planning.

A digital estate plan will give authorized people access to business accounts, and all other restricted aspects of the business when you are no longer around or have become incapacitated. But how does one create an effective digital estate plan? It’s not something that you do every day. What are the things to include? How can you guarantee that the business you have worked so hard to build can go on properly? Here are the important steps that you need to take.

Take an Inventory of All Your Digital Assets

First, you need to create a list of all the digital assets of your business, which might encompass a wider range than you think. These are all the digital files that have value for your business, from photos and videos of your products to transaction records and everything in between. It also includes all accounts you maintain for your business. Taking inventory of your assets is an effective digital estate plan.

Decide How to Manage Your Digital Assets

For each item you have listed, you must specify how to proceed with it after you pass. Who will have access? What should be done with them? How do you want them managed? It is important to be clear and concise in leaving these instructions because they will be followed when you are no longer around to make clarifications.

In selecting your designated backup person, the one who will have control over the digital assets of your business when you cannot do so, pick one who is both capable and trustworthy. In addition, they should also be well-versed in the operations of your business.

Keep an Updated List of Passwords for an Effective Digital Estate Planning

Practically everything now is online and requires a login name and password. It is crucial to keep all of this login information in a place that is not only completely safe but also accessible to authorized entities when the time comes.

A great way to store your passwords as an effective digital estate plan is by using a password manager. Here, you can safely store any online credentials. It also conveniently allows any authorized entity to access the login information. With a password manager, you can also easily update the saved passwords whenever you change them.

Strengthen Your Digital Security

When a business owner passes away, there will be quite a few entities with a vested interest in the business. This people will try to get their hands on it. They might think that since the owner has died, no one would watch the gates, and getting in would be easier. This would not be true if you increased your data security as early as now.

Multi-factor authentication is one of the most popular methods people are using today as a login procedure. This is because it can add a robust layer of security to any account. Besides traditional passwords, you should also activate the use of one-time passcodes. This is to ensure that only authorized individuals will gain access to your digital assets.

Final Thoughts for an Effective Digital Estate Planning

Preparing in the event of death is no different with a company’s digital estate. To help you prepare for the inevitable, we have created a Digital Estate Planning Checklist and Password Cheat Sheet that you can download for free.

This guide contains a lot of useful information that you would need to organize a complete digital estate plan. This is one of many things you can do to protect your digital assets. If you have questions or need further assistance, our team is just a call away!

Protecting Your Business through Digital Estate Planning

glitchbusters on August 9, 2023

Keeping your business protected is very important. But you should ask yourself if you have all areas covered. Security cameras and restricted entry areas are vital for protecting the physical location. To protect employees, implement all their necessary rights and privileges, and so on. All this is important, but one thing to prioritize as a business owner is protecting your digital assets through digital estate planning.

What Are Digital Assets?

Digital assets comprise everything in your business that is, well, digital. These include data, software, applications, and intellectual property. If you are like most businesses today, your daily operations rely heavily on these digital assets. It makes sense that you safeguard them to the best of your ability with digital estate planning.

Effective Strategies for Protecting Digital Assets Using Digital Estate Planning

Cybercriminals are now very creative in launching their attacks, so business owners must be extra vigilant and meticulous in protecting digital assets. Here are some of the most effective strategies for digital estate planning that you can use.

Strong Passwords

It is surprising how many businesses today still use passwords that are so easy to crack. Hackers might have advanced strategies for infiltrating your system, but you can make their job much more difficult by using unique, complex, and strong passwords. Also, be sure to change passwords periodically to minimize the risk of a data breach. This is common practice for digital estate planning.

Access Controls

One of the easiest but most effective ways to protect your digital assets is to restrict access to them. This step will drastically reduce the risk of data falling into the wrong hands, and should there be a leak, it will be easier to trace where it originated.

Digital Estate Planning – Data Encryption

No matter how confident you are in your data security measures, you should never underestimate the capabilities of cybercriminals. In case they steal your data, high-level encryption will protect it from being exposed or used for illicit purposes. That is why a part of digital estate planning is always encrypting your data.

Biometrics

Biometrics is now a popular alternative to conventional sign-in methods. Not only is this more convenient for the users, but it also offers more security. Using fingerprints or facial recognition ensures that no one other than the allowed individual can log in. Also, people would no longer need to remember passwords or write them down, which only adds to the vulnerability of the old method.

Backup and Recovery

If anything happens, you should have a reliable data backup and recovery plan, which is essential for protecting digital assets. You must save and store backups regularly in multiple secure and protected locations.

Employee Training

Your employees can be valuable in protecting digital assets, but ironically, they are also usually the weakest link. With regular employee training, however, you can turn them into a robust first line of defense and circumvent most security threats.

Security Software

There is a wide range of software created for protecting digital assets, firewalls, threat detection applications, antivirus software, and so on. If you are unsure of which software to get, you can always enlist the help of an MSP who will recommend the best security solutions to match your needs.

Importance of Digital Estate Planning

An element of protecting digital assets is that many companies do not even think of digital estate planning. It is simply preparing your digital assets. This is so that an authorized person gains access to everything in the event of your death.

This might sound morbid, but it does not differ from other forms of estate planning. It also makes it easier for your business partners, beneficiaries, or heirs to continue the business when you are gone. As this could still be a new concept for some business owners, we have prepared a Digital Estate Planning Checklist and Password Cheat Sheet, both of which you can download for free.

In this, we delve into the advantages of having a digital estate plan, how to go about it, and why password management is a very important part of it. Our team is also ready to help you create a comprehensive digital estate plan, which is crucial for protecting your digital assets, even long after you are gone.