The Digital Ghost in the Legal Machine: Reconciling Post-Mortem Privacy with Succession Law in India
Abhijit Singh
Abstract
The surge of the digital economy is creating a complicated field of wealth, the “Digital Estate,” which has engendered a conflict between the traditional approach to devolution of property under the Indian Succession Act, 1925, and information-based privacy approaches under the DPDP Act, 2023. This report finds that a “Consent Gap” occurs in the DPDP Act, with the “Right to Nominate” creating a posthumous privacy guardian. Still, the statute systematically omits to provide an asset heir to inherit monetized, intangible digital assets. The study examines the deficiency in the existing system for digital inheritance, as it depends solely on contractual Terms of Service (ToS) following the WazirX cyber-attack and the conflicting laws in the past regarding post-mortem privacy in India. The report presents a comprehensive “Unified Digital Succession Framework” (UDSF) based on the comparative models of other countries, such as the US RUFADAA and Germany’s universal succession. The bill aims to introduce a ‘Digital Executor’ concept which would mandate the legal recognition of a ‘Digital Executor’, a tiered access concept, differentiating the economic from highly personal data, and the punishment of unauthorized post-mortem access. In conclusion, the balancing of the right to privacy and the proprietary rights of legal heirs is a pressing constitutional challenge.
Keywords
Estate, Post-Mortem Privacy, Digital Succession, Consent Gap, Digital Executor, DPDP Act, Unified Digital Succession Framework (UDSF)