It's written by lawyers, for lawyers, with lawyers in mind because probate, wills and end of life decisions/documents are legally binding and need to be written in a way that is precise & leave no question about what is meant, but not necessarily to non-lawyers.

You could contact the local Register of Deeds or County Courthouse for more info, too. If your'e in Phoenix, you could go to the State Capitol on Van Buren St.

A bit late, so probably repeating a few stuff already mentioned.


you said you have a safe, is it big and fire safe?

1) If so put all the documents with all the important info in there (for example the insurance docs, a sheet with your SS# and bank accounts....), add her jewelry in there as well this way she will access it from time to time and will know the combinations.

2) make sure she has her own account (if not already) with enough money for 2-3 months and the funeral, this way she can live off of her money (there could be red tape, frustration, insanity and large expenses) until everything clears and life gets back to somewhat normal.

3) some PW/access are not as important as they might seem at first. What I mean is that until things settle she should dip into your account since it can complicate things which is why I said in #2 that she should have an account in her name, but once things settle the money will go to her so she would not need your PW to access it.


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as an aside on PW (for any reason)

1) paper is useless
2) people should have an electronic PW keeper, not only is it the best way to have insane independent PW for each login but it is also a good way to defend against key stroke logging viruses (a virus that records what buttons you clicked on the keyboard so if for example you type in the browser the link to your bank and then your login name and then your PW the hacker has everything he needs to get you)
3) personally I would not trust any on-line PW keeper. If that place gets hacked or one bad person working for the company and you could be royally screwed..... way too much of a risk and IMHO with no gain (would you access your bank account, for example, from just any PC)

My boss would say that this kind of information is a waste of time. It sounds like you are professing what to do, and then you only say what not to do. So what is your solution for this not-online password keeper, that gets sync'd between desktops, laptops, tablets, and phones, and does so while being not-online. (If your solution involves storing password files at Dropbox or some other cloud based storage, please clarify how that is not-online.)

then you need a smarter boss


neither I gave my opinion and why I would not go with an on-line PW solution.


I use a home brew system, which is why I did not go into more detail and I can't recommend a specific PW protection system.

It would also depend on what is being discussed, for example, your PW to log on here is not so important which is why you are probably logged in automatically but you most likely use it with all your devices, on the other hand the PW for your bank account is probably the most critical one you have, but do you really need it on every device?



you missed the point. It was not the internet that is the main issue at hand (after all your PC can be hacked). It is:

1) the idea that the info is stored in an on-line database and so once the place is hacked the hacker has access to everyone's data which, in order to be useful, will tend to also have more info than just the PW. It is the same issue with retailers and credit card numbers except in the later you don't have a choice. One hack like the Target a few months ago and the guy has info for 98M CC (or the Kmart a few days ago-but I don't know how much CC info the hackers got away with).

On the other hand if we are talking an encrypted file backed up on line with all your other files then you have the added benefit of security through obscurity and the fact that the person would need to hack the cloud location as well as the data itself.

2) there is also the transmission/usage issue. If we are talking a local copy backed up once a month the info is traveling very few times over the internet and it is an encrypted file, on the other hand if the service does not use encryption during transmission that will be clear text where packet sniffers could get the data.

I love LastPass.
I just signed up for tractor forum and auto generated this password: 6hWUw90A7&$#s4WsCsc$XgyT

Because I have LastPass on my tablet, if/when I get an email notification that there is response to my thread and I'm away from my PC, I can open LastPass on my tablet/phone, do search for tractor and copy password; then click on email's URL and paste password when asked for credentials.
I can't imagine correctly typing this password if my life depended on it.

From your comments, you have nothing on the boss I was talking of.


Actually you state what you don't advise, and don't give advice on what you think does work. And you reiterate that here, and don't seem to understand what the issue is with that methodology.


Again, he's asking for a solution, of which you don't really give one.


This is part of the issue. The idea that not everything is important leads to problems. If you view your bank as most important, I'd say that's wrong. Because I can likely get your bank to reset your password, and they'll send temporary login info to your email address, so if I can break into your email, that's likely the most important, as I can get passwords reset, and changed to what I want as a hacker, given access to your email.


So, you're storing your password file in an online cloud storage solution. And you think somehow this is safer than a password storage site? You do realize Dropbox had an event about a year ago, where they gave access to everyones Dropbox in the clear for about 12 hours. The problem is the data is encrypted and decrypted at Dropbox's site, not on the local PC.

Dropbox is known for being a leaky bucket when it comes to security: [Link: readwrite.com]

A good password manager like LastPass encrypts the password file on the local PC, and the encryption password is not sent to LastPass, so even if someone were to break their server, it doesn't do them much good.


LOL You're talking about clear text for a password management system? You're showing you know nothing about how these systems work.

You've shown nothing here. You've not given a solution, which is what was asked for.

Your comments make it clear, you don't understand LastPass, or the other online password management sites.

A good system, like LastPass, stores an encrypted store of the passwords. LastPass themselves admit they don't know the password and if you lose it, they can't recover it for you. It is only decrypted locally on the device, so a hacker which breakss into the LastPass site, even if they got the files, they would still need to break the encryption. Of course a user would have the opportunity to change their passwords long before a hacker could throw even the strongest supercomputers at it, and ever have a chance at breaking the encryption.

I work at a place that is paranoid about security, and the security of their network and IT infrastructure. We've had people whose full time job is security go over LastPass with people there. I'd bet you have way more holes in your homebrew system, than LastPass has in their system. Go ahead and rely on security by obscurity... Bruce Schneir, a foremost expert on security, used to profess that "security by obscurity" was bad. Now he professes that "obscurity means insecurity."

[Link: schneier.com]

1) How will your hacker know my bank and e-mail

2) Don't know about your bank but it is not that easy to reset a PW with my bank you are asked several personal questions

3) like any intelligent person I have several e-mails that I use for different stuff so how will the hacker know the right one to input at the bank

4) Even if we go more general or assume the hacker manages to send a PW reset at the bank you are missing that


I did not say that



lol so now you are an expert on LastPass as well as what I use even though you know nothing about iwhat I use.