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Ask Slashdot: What Should Happen To Your Data After You Die?

Nerval's Lobster writes "Death is Nature's way of telling you it's time to get off the Internet. But when you finally shuffle off this mortal coil, you leave something behind: all your email and other digital assets. That's a huge problem not only for the deceased — once you're on the wrong side of the Great Beyond, there's no way to delete those incriminating messages — but also any relatives who might want to access your (former) life. And it's a problem Google's seeking to solve with the new Inactive Account Manager. (In an April 11 blog posting, Google product manager Andreas Tuerk suggested that Inactive Account Manager wasn't a 'great name' for the product, but maybe the company shouldn't be so hard on itself: it's a way better name than, say, Google Death Dashboard.) Inactive Account Manager will delete your Google-related data (Gmail, etc.) after a set amount of time, or else send that data to 'trusted contacts' you set up before your untimely demise. Which raises an interesting, semi-Google-related question: What do you want to have happen to your data after you die? Give it to loved ones, or have an automated system nuke it all? Should more companies that host email and data offer plans like Inactive Account Manager?"

4 of 122 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Hilarious scenarios for Friday by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    4. Kid gets grounded from the computer, mom receives all his porn.

  2. Doesn't matter by linear+a · · Score: 5, Funny

    Taking everybody with me.

  3. Re:Nuke it all by ackthpt · · Score: 5, Funny

    It will be like you never existed

    Is it possible to be low-level formatted after you are gone?

    "How'd he die?" "Head crashed." "Oh, ow."

    --

    A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
  4. Re:Nuke it all by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Is it possible to be low-level formatted after you are gone?

    Yes. It's called composting.