Privacy a little too far?

I'm surprised that Yahoo doesn't have a policy whereby if the family provides a death certificate that they release it. I believe mail organizations are like this. It certainly was the case in my mother's death.

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Source: CNN

Dead soldier's kin plead for e-mail

Tuesday, December 21, 2004 Posted: 10:13 AM EST (1513 GMT)

WIXOM, Michigan (AP) -- The family of a Marine killed in Iraq is pleading with Internet giant Yahoo! for access to his e-mail account, which the company says is off-limits under its privacy policy.

Lance Cpl. Justin M. Ellsworth, 20, was killed by a roadside bomb on November 13 during a foot patrol in Al Anbar province. The family wants the complete e-mail file that Justin maintained, including notes to and from others.

"I want to be able to remember him in his words. I know he thought he was doing what he needed to do. I want to have that for the future," said John Ellsworth, Justin's father. "It's the last thing I have of my son."

But without the account's password, the request has been repeatedly denied. In addition, Yahoo! policy calls for erasing all accounts that are inactive for 90 days. Yahoo! also maintains that all users agree at sign-up that rights to a member's ID or contents within an account terminate upon death.

"While we sympathize with any grieving family, Yahoo! accounts and any contents therein are nontransferable" even after death, said Karen Mahon, a Yahoo! spokeswoman.

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I'm sure once the gov gets a hold of this, they'll have his email in no time.

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Yahoo! also maintains that all users agree at sign-up that rights to a member's ID or contents within an account terminate upon death.

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Just a sec.... was this included in the agreement while signing up for an account? It is kind of silly isn't it? The company doesn't stand to lose anything by letting the family members read his email. Anyway, why do they need his email so badly? He probably wrote a lot of mail to his family, they've got those letters with them anyhow. What do they need his id for?

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Anyway, why do they need his email so badly? He probably wrote a lot of mail to his family, they've got those letters with them anyhow. What do they need his id for?

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Quoted from the article above:

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"I want to be able to remember him in his words. I know he thought he was doing what he needed to do. I want to have that for the future," said John Ellsworth, Justin's father. "It's the last thing I have of my son."

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When you lose someone, sometimes anything can be something nice to remember them by. Particularly when it is a violent early death (regardless of whether he knew the risks or not). It will probably also give them a list of contacts of people who may want to send a card of sympathy or flowers or something (friend listing).

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When you lose someone, sometimes anything can be something nice to remember them by.

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yea, i guess your right. a terrible shame though. The guy is just about my age.

I would be appalled if my family went digging through my personal life after my death. My entire email file and all folders? Love letters to those I wish private etc.. Not that I am hiding anything, but the thought is disturbing. Hopefully they will know where to draw a line. I would hate to have something that makes me feel better but would be considered rude by the person I love.

This points up the difference between what US Citizens percieve as privacy rights, what US corporations perceive as privacy rights, and what others (Canadians, EU citizens, etc) perceive as privacy rights.

US Citizens need to read the fine print. They do not own the contents of their accounts with Yahoo, MSN, or any other provider. While they can expect a certain level of privacy with regard to casual observation, the contents are subject to subpoena or law enforcement observation. Yahoo isn't the only provider with similar policy with regard to deceased account holders.

Consider, however, that what the deceased soldier shared with parents and family members may not be entirely in line with what the soldier shared with friends or fellow-soldiers. The release of the account contents could proved devastating to the family and their perceptions.

I'm not siding with Yahoo, mind you. However, personal responsibility (in this case, on the part of the deceased soldier prior to being deceased) would include making arrangements in case of the unthinkable. I remember making arrangements and trying to think of all that before going into combat. It's hard, but should be done.

Being that e-mail is generally informal, it would be terrible if something in my mail was taken out of context and I wasn't around to explain.

There is also the issue of confirming that the deceased was actually the owner of the email account. While it may be easy enough for a family member to say that they always sent email to that account most free email accounts ask for a very small amount of personal information.

So how do you make sure that [email protected] is really John Doe? I don't see how it can be done. It would definitely take way to much effort for something that is a free service to begin with. I would definitely not want my private email given to any of my family members for the reasons that other people have listed above. If there is something that I want shared I'll put that into my will.

They should be able to correlate IP addresses that access the email over time, specifically those overseas and those from their house.

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Originally posted here by MsMittens
They should be able to correlate IP addresses that access the email over time, specifically those overseas and those from their house.

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I guess I should have said that I don't see how it could be done easily and cheaply. Why would a business wish to provide that type of investigative service when the account itself costs nothing? That investigative work isn't going to do itself, and it would probably cost anywhere from 20-50$ in labor for each request. Multiple that out by the number of possible inquiries like this that yahoo could get in a year and it gets costly. Plus, think about how easily the supposed family members could fake the information or acquire enough information about a particular users web habits that they could fool yahoo into giving out information to the totally wrong people. Death certificates are easily forged and would have to be confirmed and it's not that difficult to find out what ISP or geographic area a particular person is browsing from. Using just IPs you would have to get the ISP involved to dig up historic information about DHCP lease requests, assuming the requestors use broadband. Then there is the whole issue of how long do you keep IP addresses logged? What if you only log 3 months and the person has been away for longer than three months? Do you buy more disk drives to fulfill more requests that in the long run don't make you any money? It's just not good business sense. If it was a dialup account the problems get much worse, as anybody else on that particular ISP in that geographic area could have had the same IP address..

It's a bit cliche, but you get what you pay for. If it was a business that I owned I would make sure that my policies were written in such a way to protect myself from having to provide additional "free" services for something that is already free.

I think what it comes down to would be under US law is yahoo obliged to give access to someones personnel belongings to their next of kin? I would think that if the question was put like that to a judge Yahoo might have problems justifying their position.

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I would be appalled if my family went digging through my personal life after my death. My entire email file and all folders? Love letters to those I wish private etc.. Not that I am hiding anything, but the thought is disturbing.

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Unfortunately that is one of the things that needs to be done in such circumstances. The other choices are either to get rid of everything or keep everything. IMHO neither one is a good long term choice.

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A Yahoo spokeswoman said the company's terms of service require the company not to disclose private e-mail communications for its users. Yahoo will turn over the account to family members only after they go through the courts to verify their identity and relationship with the deceased.

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http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9588_22-5500057.html

I wonder if they have it that way so if something (legal issues) crop up in the future, they have courts' decision as their defense??

I side with Yahoo!. This goes to show that atleast one company abides by it's own Privacy Policy. In the states, the Supreme Court recently ruled that Privacy Policies on websites are not legal documents, claiming that "nobody reads them."

Something to remember a family member by is fine, but not by delving into their personal life. If I knew my family would get access to my email account, I'd be rather unnerved.

Just my $.02
A_T

Yea, That's taking "Privacy" a little to far but in a since it's his "account" not theirs. Plus, all the letters he sent to them they should have? If they deleted them and want them back, he may not even have them stored still? In addition that, as mentioned before how do they know that it is actually "his E-mail account, free E-mails ask for very little personal information."

I'd have to say they shouldn't get it, not until they give a better reason. Nothing of value or real sentimental worth will be on there considering everything of "sentimental" value was probaly already sent.

I imagine this would be different if the deceased put in his will that family can have access to his personal account on yahoo. Of course then he would have provided a password. Since there is no reference to the account in the will. I think yahoo is making the right decison.

Cheers,
-D

I'd have to side with Yahoo on this one. Not sure I'd want my parents or anyone else reading my e-mail when I'm not around, dead or not. Not that I have anything to hide, just doesn't seem necessary for anyone to look into my private files when I'm gone.

Email has been one of those tricky things that has gotten individuals, businesses, etc in various forms of trouble. One's email, especially if it's a private "freemail" or regular account (paid, at home, etc) should be left to themselves and the privacy that's in question.

It's one thing if he had it in his will along with the current password because then that's willful transference and whoever has POA would be able to get into his account (or something similar). On the flip side, since that's not the case, and personally, I wouldn't be leaving my email accounts in my will as it's my private writings, regardless of content, I think Yahoo's doing the right thing. Since when does a web document of policy not legal simply because they're not read? This falls into category of everything we read. Just because we sign a physical document doesn't mean we're responsible (in comparison to checking a box saying "I, user_name here, have read and understand and abide by all the rules in this document...").

Yahoo's doing the right thing and if this guy wanted his parents to have access to his email, they'd have it. I don't think it'd be right nor fair to the deceased to get access to something they didn't have prior because I can guarantee I'd consider it a gross invasion of privacy if I were deceased and my parents were digging through my email that I didn't give them access to.

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I think what it comes down to would be under US law is yahoo obliged to give access to someones personnel belongings to their next of kin? I would think that if the question was put like that to a judge Yahoo might have problems justifying their position.

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That is actually not the case at all in the US. If you die, and you have personal possessions they are not immediately returned to your next of kin. The only circumstance that allows for your items to be distributed as you wish is through a will. If you don't have a will all of your items go into what is known as probate and it is left up to a judge to determine what should be done with your items.

In this case as you don't really own the email account, I don't think a court would have the ability to rule on something like this. Even more, it is a matter that is left up to the individual states, this type of thing is not handled by federal courts.

I actually would prefer that someone did have access to my address book on my e-mail accounts in the event of my death. I have a good few people in it that I contact almost exclusively by e-mail and I would want them to know why I was no longer able to contact them.

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-5...=zdfd.newsfeed

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Despite its compliance in the case, Yahoo said it will not reverse its company policy, choosing instead to honor the privacy of account holders....

.....John Ellsworth could not be reached for comment Thursday. But in an interview with Detroit radio station WJR, he credited Yahoo for acting quickly and responsibly once the legal issues were settled,

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Hopefully it gives the family the closure they were looking for.