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How to notify or access Apple iCloud when someone has passed away

Executor and Fiduciary Guide - Apple iCloud Administration

Free guide for executors, fiduciaries, and the firms that advise them.

Administering an estate professionally? Eternal Pro captures every client asset at intake, traditional and digital, so accounts like this one are never found late. See how it works or book a demo.

Our guide on how to notify or access Apple iCloud about a deceased person.

Steps to notify or administer Apple iCloud

Verify authorization

Before starting, gather the documentation showing your legal authorization to proceed. If in doubt, double check with your estate executor, or trustee. Apple iCloud generally requires:

Legacy Access Key - A key that you generate and provide to your Legacy Contact.
Death Certificate - A death certificate is an official document issued by the government, which declares cause of death, location of death, time of death and other information about the deceased.
Court Order - A valid court order establishing that it was the deceased person's intent to grant access to their account after the person passed away, and that the provider is compelled by law to act.

Apple iCloud Supports Advance Digital Directives

Check to see if the deceased left an advance directive with Apple iCloud, which supports:

Legacy Contact
Legacy Contacts can look after memorialized profiles.

Fiduciary authority. In most US states a fiduciary's access to a decedent's digital assets is governed by RUFADAA, the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act. Where the account holder used the provider's own online tool — a legacy contact, an inactive account manager, or a beneficiary designation — that choice generally takes priority over conflicting will or trust language. Check the directive settings before relying on the will. General information, not legal advice.

Identify wishes

iCloud enables users to store and sync data scross devices. Identify what the deceased's instructions are, or what they wanted to have happen to this asset when they passed away. This is usually located in their will or living trust documents. Or, if they're using Eternal Me, authorized executors can login and view their instructions.

Apple iCloud supports these options directly:

Access - Access to the account may be granted in advance.

An authorized fiduciary can also carry out these actions manually for Apple iCloud:

Manual Deletion

Request removal or deletion of the asset, or closure of account.
Custom

Attempt custom instructions for managing this item.

Administer Apple iCloud

Now that you've verified your authorization and identified the deceased's wishes, do the work to carry out their instructions. You can click here to begin the process of administering Apple iCloud.

Document activities

It's important to carefully record each interaction, and be able to check on and report the status to heirs and estate executors. This is automatically handled for users of Eternal Me.

Handling this for a client?

Most digital assets are found the hard way — a renewal charge, a forwarded email, a relative who remembers. By then the account may be locked, or already deleted.

Eternal Pro is estate intake software for law firms and professional fiduciaries. Clients inventory their own assets — property, bank and investment accounts, crypto wallets, email, subscriptions, social profiles — in under 15 minutes, with instructions and directives attached to each one. When a matter reaches administration, the list already exists.

Traditional and digital assets in one inventory
Client-recorded instructions captured per asset at intake
Automatic update reminders, so the record is current when it matters
Flat rate, unlimited matters · SOC 2 Type 2 · HIPAA compliant

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Continue to other assets

After handling the notification, move onto other assets. Here's a selection of other digital assets to address.

Poloniex

Country Club Membership

Stop finding digital assets after the fact

Eternal Pro builds a complete inventory of your clients' traditional and digital assets during intake, and keeps it current for as long as they are your clients.