How to give wife emergency access to logins, passwords, etc.?
- by Torben Gundtofte-Bruun
I'm the digital guru in my household. My wife is good with email and forum websites but she trusts me with all our important digital stuff -- such as online banking and other things that require passwords, but also family photos and the plethora of other digital things in a modern home. We discuss relevant actions but it's always me that executes the actions.
If I should get "hit by a bus" then my wife would be thoroughly stranded -- she would have no idea what digital stuff is where on our computer, how to access it, what online accounts we have, and their login credentials are. It would also leave my many public appearances (personal websites, email accounts, social networks, etc.) unresolved.
To complicate things, I'm one of those people who don't use password as my password everywhere; I use a mix of SuperGenPass and LastPass, and also two-factor authentication whenever possible. I don't have much hope that she would find her way through a written explanation of all that in a stressful situation.
I could just tell her that she should ask my tech-savvy twin brother and then entrust him with my LastPass master passphrase. I feel that would have a high chance of success, but it's inelegant and leaves my wife without control of the information.
How can I ensure that my wife has access to my digital remains?