Almost every website will have a different policy for dead account holders, so I will discuss what popular websites such as Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo email accounts, MySpace and Facebook social networking websites do in the event of a death of one of their users.

Gmail

If you have a Gmail account and you pass away, your next of kin will be allowed to access your emails. The account will stay open forever, but as the next of kin, you are able to request it to be deleted. To get access to the email account, you will need to supply the following information by fax or mail to Google to be granted account access of the deceased user account.

• Your full name (next of kin), your contact information and a verifiable email address
• The Gmail email address of the deceased person
• An email containing the full headers of an email message that the deceased person has emailed you with the entire contents of the email
• Proof of death
• Documentation to prove that you are the lawfully allowed to access their email (if the deceased is over 18). If deceased person is under 18 of age, you must provide a birth certificate

After you’ve compiled the information, Google will verify it and grant you access to the user account.

More information about accessing a deceased person’s mail can be found in Google’s Support Page.

So if you have private information that you don’t want people to look at when you are dead, don’t use Gmail (use Yahoo instead).

If you are trying to access a deceased person’s email account, you may first want to try to reset the user’s password.

Hotmail

If Hotmail accounts are left inactive for a period of time, the email account along with all the information will be eventually deleted (within the year) and therefore, you will not be able to access it. If you die, your next of kin will be granted access to your account provided they supply supporting documents such as a death certificate (similar to what Google needs). Hotmail will not reset the password for the deceased person, but you have to fax or mail information to gain access to the account such as:

• Your email address
• Your shipping address (as they send you a package in the mail
• Documents to state your are the benefactor or you have power of attorney
• Your photocopied driver’s license
• A photocopy of the death certificate
• Information about the account holder such as first and last name, date of birth, city, state, zip, approximate date of the account creation and the approximate date of last sign in.

If you require more information, you can get it at Windows Live Help.

Yahoo

Yahoo has a much stricter policy over who can get access to your account. And that is no one. If you want to ensure no one has access to your emails when you die, you would want to choose Yahoo. Yahoo will not grant permission to anyone to access a deceased user’s account. The only permission Yahoo grants is for the account to be deleted. Therefore, Yahoo does not allow anyone to access your emails. The only way someone can do this is if they reset your account password.

Facebook

Facebook will not grant anyone access to a deceased user account, but if the user of the account is deceased, their page will be turned into a memorial page once reqested. By filling out the form to turn an deceased users page into a memorial page, Facebook will remove sensitive information on the account like status updates and will only allow current friends to access the page. Family members will then be allowed to customise the page of the deceased user.

MySpace

MySpace deceased user policy is a bit vague, but they state that if you are the next of kin, they will not grant you access to edit, or delete any of the content or settings on the account yourself, but you can request it to be removed if you deem appropriate. You can simply email accountcare@support.myspace.com and attach appropriate documentation such as a death certificate. However, if you have access to their email account, MySpace recommends that you reset the user password.

In the end”¦

If you die, your accounts will most likely stay active unless the site automatically deletes the account due to inactivity, or your family has requested the account to be closed. Most sites allow access to your personal data by your next of kin, but to gain this right, they will need to mail proof to the website. Even though you may have died, if you use one password for all these sites, your family members might be able to use that password, or even guess your secret question. But then again, when you die, would you even care what people find in your email inbox or social networking sites?

If you are trying to access a deceased person’s email, try resetting their email, look to see if they have stored the password in a file, or see if they have written it down on paper.

Have you ever gone through something like this? What did you do to secure the deceased user account? Your experience could help easy the transition for others. Share them in the comments.

I guess it’s because they want us to stay forever but sometimes you just really don’t like the site or maybe you are trying to clean up your accounts (because you have so many all over the net).

Whatever the reason may be, I’m sure you’ll find that this little cheat sheet will make deleting those unwanted accounts quick, easy and painless.

Yahoo

There are two ways to delete your Yahoo account. The first way is to totally abandon it for at least four months. Inactive Yahoo accounts are deactivated after four months so if you’re in no rush to get rid of it, you can simply stop using it.

The other way to delete your Yahoo account is to visit the Account Termination page.

• Log into your Yahoo account. If you’re already logged in you may have to re-enter your password just for verification purposes.
• Click here to get to the Account Termination page.

Facebook

Facebook offers two options. You can either deactivate your account or permanently delete it. Of course, the deactivation method is much easier to find than the permanent deletion option. One thing you should know is that if you deactivate your Facebook account, your profile information will still be saved such as your friends, photos, interests, etc. On the other hand, permanently deleting your account will remove all of your information from Facebook and nothing will be saved.

To deactivate your account:

• Hover your mouse over the Settings menu in the top right of any Facebook page and click on “Account Settings”.
• Click on the “Deactivate Account” link at the bottom of the page.

To permanently delete your account:

• Click on Help at the bottom of any Facebook page.
• Search for “delete account” in the search box underneath the Help Center heading.
• Click on the “I want to permanently delete my account” link and read the 2 paragraphs there.



• Click on the link at the end of the last paragraph, read what’s there and then click the “Submit” button.
• Click here for the easy route.

MySpace

MySpace makes things a little bit easier, no searching needed.

• Click on “My Account” in the top right corner of any MySpace page.
• Click on the “Account” link.
• Click on the “Cancel Account” link at the bottom of the page.
• Select the reason why you want to cancel your account, and then click the “Cancel My Account” button.
• Click here for the easy route.

Ning

One thing about Ning is that even when you delete your account, the content that you’ve added to any social networks you were a part of will remain on those networks. If you don’t want your content to remain, you’ll have to delete it yourself. An easy way to do that is to simply leave each network you belong to separately before deleting your actual Ning account.

In order to leave a social network on Ning:

• Sign into the network.
• Click on the “My Settings” link in the top of the right hand column.
• Click on the “Leave (Social Network Name Here)” link at the bottom of that page.

To leave the Ning network altogether you will have to contact Ning by clicking here. There is no option in the “I have a question about” menu for deleting an account so you will have to pick which one you think fits best.

MSN

Just like Yahoo there are two ways to delete your MSN account. You can either stop using your account for 30 days or delete it manually. After 30 days of non-use your MSN account will become inactive and after 90 days your passport will become inactive.

To manually delete your MSN account:

• Click on the little arrow next to your name in the top right corner of any Hotmail page.
• Click on the “View Your Account” menu option.
• Click on the “Close Account” link at the bottom of the page.
• Read the info, enter your password to verify your identity and then click on the “Yes” button.
• Click here for the easy route.

Twitter

Note: If there are issues with Twitter, the option to delete you account will be disabled and you’ll get an alert message like the one picture below. So, hopefully Twitter is in good shape if and when you try to delete your account.

• Click on the “Settings” link in the top right corner of any Twitter page.
• Click on the “Delete My Account” link at the bottom left side of the page.
• Confirm that you want to delete your account.
• Click here for the easy route.

FriendFeed

FriendFeed is another site that makes you do a little searching before being able to delete your account.

• Click on the “help” link at the bottom of any FriendFeed page.
• Click on the “Using FriendFeed” header to expand it.
• Click on the “How do I delete my account?” link which will be the last link under that section.
• Enter your password in the first box, type the word “delete” in the next box, enter the reason why you’re deleting your account in the last box.
• Click on the “Permanently delete my account” button.
• Click here for the easy route.

Jaiku

Jaiku has the account deletion option right where you’d expect it to be.

• Click on the “Settings” link in the top right of any Jaiku page.
• Click on the “Your Profile” link under the Account heading.
• Click on the “Want to delete your account?” link at the bottom of the page.
• Click on the “Goodbye Cruel World, Goodbye” button.
• Click here for the easy route.

If there are any other websites that we haven’t mentioned here, why don’t you tell us how to cancel an account on that site?

Image Credit : Gaudium De Lingua