Don't Lose Your Digital Memories Forever

STEP, a worldwide body for professionals that help families plan for their futures, launched its Protect Your Digital Memories campaign recently to encourage people to make plans for what happens to their photos and videos after they’ve gone.

Don’t lose your memories forever: STEP calls on the government and service providers like Apple, Google and Meta to do more to help people to pass on their digital memories.

Recently released online YouGov polling released shows that:

• 64 per cent of people say that what happens to sentimental digital possessions like photos, videos and social accounts after they have gone is important to them, compared with 33 per cent for financial digital assets.

• But over half of respondents (57 per cent) have not made any plans to pass on their digital assets.

• Strikingly, only 3 per cent of people have used the digital legacy tools provided by Google, Apple and others.

STEP is calling for the government and digital service providers to do more to help people to make plans for their assets, and to find better ways to support grieving loved ones who wish to access a loved one’s account

The professional membership body STEP is encouraging the public to plan what will happen to their ‘digital memories’ – the precious photos, videos and the contents of social and email accounts that could otherwise be lost to the cloud after they have gone.

Commenting on the campaign, Emily Deane, Head of Government Affairs at STEP, said:

"With so much of our lives now lived online, we must make plans to pass on our digital memories or risk them being lost on the cloud."

"We know from our previous research with estate planning practitioners that not being able to access a loved one’s digital assets can be a great source of distress for grieving families."

"Losing a loved one is hard enough without losing their precious photos too. That is why STEP has launched its Protect your Digital Memories campaign."

"This new website, gives easy tips for how to plan what will happen to our digital assets when we are no longer able to access them. It only takes a few minutes to use the legacy tools that Apple, Google, and other providers already have in place. Just ten minutes now could save our loved ones a great deal of distress in the future."

STEP is calling for:

1. Every service provider to provide, and encourage users to make use of, a comprehensive legacy tool to enable people to decide what happens to their account

2. Every service provider to have a clause that allows access to a nominated person within its terms and conditions

3. Legislation that allows access to a nominated person in the appropriate circumstances.

Michael Culver, Chair of Solicitors for the Elderly (SFE), the membership body setting the standards for older client law, says: "This is a really important campaign from STEP. It’s clear that everyone – including lawyers – needs to be more aware of the need to consider digital assets when planning ahead."

"Without a plan for digital assets, things can quickly get messy, time-consuming and stressful for family members.”