I started helping a friend’s estate planning. I was shocked to learn that when someone dies with a will, essentially, everyone named in the will is doxxed along with the deceased’s assets and other sensitive information contained in the will, additionally, all court filings related to the deceased’s probate beyond the will.
On one hand, this is a natural consequence of a public probate process administered by courts. On the other hand, this is a gross violation of privacy and presents real security risks for people and assets involved (theft of assets, identity theft, stalking, harassment, etc.). I imagine this would be especially damaging to people who have tried to keep their privacy (but discover their information has been made public), anyone who is named a beneficiary of a large amount of wealth, high-risk people such as family violence survivors, etc.
I searched about this issue but found nothing from the privacy advocate/community perspective, just law firms advising estate planners to create trusts (and use other methods) to keep information out of wills and avoid probate. Law firms commonly advise estate planners to avoid probate, not purely for privacy but for a wide range of reasons.
To get an idea of thoughts/opinions and level of awareness in the privacy community, I came up with some questions.
- Did you know about this issue before reading this post?
- What etiquette should will makers adhere to? For example, should will makers obtain consent from everyone they intend to name in their will?
- What methods can will makers adopt to protect the privacy of their beneficiaries, executors, assets etc.?
- What can people do to protect themselves from this kind of doxxing, say, if they anticipate being named in someone’s will?
- For perspective, how does this issue compare to other privacy issues involving documents that are customarily made public?
- What other thoughts/opinions do you have about this issue?