In the present time, crypto investment is turning out to be a popular option for investors and firms. But there’s a query that makes everyone worried about bitcoin that is- what happens to your Bitcoins when you die?
As per the Cremation Institute study in 2020, about 90% of the people owning cryptocurrency are concerned about their cryptos and what will happen to it if they die. Moreover, even with the rising concern among crypto owners, holders with cryptocurrency don’t favour wills much more for inheritance purposes than the investors with no cryptos.
Bitcoin is considered a peer-to-peer e-cash version in the white paper explanation, enabling transactions online to transfer directly without any financial institution or bank’s presence as a mediator.
Being a decentralized currency with a distributed public network, Bitcoin is not ruled by any bank or central authority. And the user funds are not under any mediator institutions’ control. No entity or institution rules over Bitcoin, but the bitcoin owners can control it.
Millions of funds in the form of cryptocurrency losses every year as the owners die. CoinCover (crypto-insurance firm) estimated that about 4 million Bitcoins ranging for $68 billion when published are not circulated with access loss. In this, a large part was from the owners who died.
One can conclude that Bitcoin cryptocurrency will leave or get buried with the owner after their death. One must know that there exist several ways for any crypto investor to pass on the bitcoins to their coming generation. It is essential to follow some planning and decision-making steps and know-how regarding the cryptocurrency working procedure.
Key sharing among the trusted ones
One of the most convenient methods to pass on your cryptos to a trusted member from your family is sharing the keys. Among the crypto owners, most prominent ones have relied upon this method to share their cryptocurrencies to the future generation ahead.
Hal Finney (Recipient of the first transaction involving Bitcoin from Satoshi Nakamoto BTC creator and past Bitcoin supporter) made a will over all his cryptocurrency holdings in the coming generation just by sharing the keys. Before dying in 2014, Finney stated a few words:
“I have stored all my bitcoins in a safe box for a deposit, and my children are a technical geek. I have a belief that all the bitcoins are completely safe for my daughter and son.”
It is one of the most well-sorted and straightforward practices to transfer cryptos to your family members after passing away. However, not everyone might feel comfortable with this method in the crypto world. It might be a risky way to transfer cryptocurrencies like bitcoins.
Unlock bitcoins over exchanges using a death certificate
With the bitcoin network, no one cares about the transactions or inheritance things. But there are some crypto exchanges helping family members to access the deceased person’s cryptos. Major crypto exchanges allow family members to gain crypto access over the deceased person’s cryptocurrencies. Though, it demands some documents last a will and death certificate.
Is it worth relying on services for a crypto inheritance?
There do exist projects dedicated to digital assets or cryptocurrency inheritance. For instance, Casa and TrustVerse and Safe Haven companies search for an innovative solution to help people access digital assets like cryptocurrency by endowing it with cryptography blockchain-established technology.
Safe Haven Company had a platform “Inheriti” digitally for inheritance purposes that enable users to access the deceased’s digital assets. Not only this, but it also helps in accessing profiles on social media networks.
With the services helping people get access over their deceased family member’s crypto assets, it is beneficial to avoid losing cryptos after death. It is also not much riskier in comparison with the secret key sharing method. Herein, you don’t need to worry about your security keys or any unknown person accessing your bitcoin wallet. In the current time, every problem is finding a solution. For the investors, a major issue was regarding the crypto inheritance after death. But you can learn about some exchanges that can be beneficial for your future generation too.
