Ask HN: Help me retrieve my (past away) friend Google account

[aberatiu]

My friend past away two months ago from a heart seisure and his wife has tried to retrieve his Google account with no success. She does know his password but he had that phone thing activated where you receive a code on you phone. She doesn't have his phone anymore as it was a subscription and was canceled shortly after his death.

My request is that someone from here (as I know people from Google lurk here) lend me a hand with this. I'm happy to answer any questions regarding him and his account.

[pseingatl]

Open an estate under the probate laws of your state. Appoint an executor. Subpoena all files that Google has with respect to the decedent. Done.

[mikeyouse]

Follow the instructions here:

https://support.google.com/mail/answer/14300?hl=en

Google has ~1 billion users, this isn't a terribly uncommon problem.

[pseingatl → mikeyouse]

Would you trust Google to decide based on some unwritten standard? Why, when we have courts for that? Going to court short-circuits this process and prevents Google from destroying records.

[mikeyouse → pseingatl]

> Would you trust Google to decide based on some unwritten standard?

Yeah probably. Nearly every company has policies and procedures in place to sort this stuff out after death, they have no incentive to destroy records or make it hard on you.

> Why, when we have courts for that?

Because it's much easier (and cheaper) than getting lawyers involved.

[pseingatl → mikeyouse]

If Google were to reliably accede to your request, sure. If it was just a question of filling out a form, sure. But if there's a single hiccup, you're lost. You are completely dependent on Google's goodwill. They have no incentive to destroy records? They don't, but Google has no incentive to comply with individual requests either. Have you tried to reach Google customer service lately? Oh wait, they don't have customer service. Or they sorta kinda do, if you're buying advertising.

But the issue is greater than just Google--the issue is the disposition of digital assets after death. Why should digital assets be treated differently from any other asset? If you think that banks gleefully return money to a decedent's family after death you haven't dealt with this issue much. Having the power to issue court orders tends to enforce the rights of the heirs.

Or you can just hide from those terrible lawyers, mail forms to Google (or e-mail them, everyone knows e-mails always arrive) and hope for the best.

I hope it works out for you.

[mikeyouse → pseingatl]

This is a surprisingly strong response.. I mean no disrespect to lawyers but they're expensive and often unnecessary for simple matters. If for whatever reason Google gives you the run around, by all means, get a lawyer involved -- it's not like there's a deadline to retrieve your data.

> If you think that banks gleefully return money to a decedent's family after death you haven't dealt with this issue much.

I actually just went through this and to be honest, it was completely painless. Maybe it was a good bank compared to most, and it was definitely a small-balance account, but a single form verifying next-of-kin faxed with a copy of the death certificate was enough to get access to the account.