Who controls your digital assets after you die? Will your estate administrators be able to access your cryptocurrency wallet or will it be left to gather dust? Can your estate administrators get access to update your social media and email accounts, or will notifications and email continue to pile up unanswered?
On April 21, 2026, the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta issued reasons in Wada Estate (Re), 2026 ABKB 309, commenting on a growing trend of judicial applications against technology companies which refuse to deliver estate assets to Canadian executors and administrators. The Court affirmed that technology companies are bound by grants of administration and probate issued to estate executors and administrators, and should not undermine the efficiencies of the estate process.
The Court’s comments are part of a growing body of thought leadership which has begun to recognize that estate administrators and executors should be empowered by grants of administration to work with technology companies directly when administering estates.
Background
The applicants (the “Administrators”), were appointed administrators of the estate of the deceased, having received a Grant of Administration from the Alberta Court of King’s Bench in September 2025. A Grant of Administration provides express authorization to exercise all rights to access, handle, distribute, and dispose of a deceased’s digital assets, including email accounts, social media pages, cloud data, photographs, and data stored on the deceased’s cellular device.
The effect of a Grant of Administration is to provide an estate’s administrator with the same authority and power over the deceased’s digital assets as the deceased had when he or she was alive. The Administrators effectively stepped into the shoes of the deceased for the purpose of managing the deceased’s digital assets.
The Administrators provided their Grant of Administration to a technology company which controlled some of the deceased’s digital assets, asking for access to the deceased’s accounts and passwords so that they could fulfill their obligations as administrators by organizing and overseeing those assets. But Administrators ran into a legal firewall – the technology company asserted that it required a further court order tailored specifically to the technology company before it would grant access to the deceased’s assets.
The Administrators, faced with few choices, were put to the “time and expense” of a further court application to obtain an order which specifically identified them as the rightful inheritors to the deceased’s assets and personal information.
Underpinning these circumstances was the technology company’s terms of service, which expressly provided no right of survivorship to the assets of a deceased user. However, as the Court ultimately observed, that express term was belied by the technology company’s own website and services, which provided advice to users seeking to access the accounts of their deceased loved ones.
The Decision
The Court granted the application and issued the requested order.
The Court wrote a strongly-worded decision, describing itself as taking the “unusual step” of issuing written reasons in a straightforward and unopposed chambers application (the company neither appeared at nor opposed the application) because “refusals by large technology companies to deal with personal representatives of estates without a specific court order places unnecessary and unjustified burdens on estates and the Court.”
It took the further step of inviting estate administrators and executives to use the reasons in Wada Estate (Re) to explain the relevant law of Alberta to other technology companies which request specific court orders before dealing with estate representatives.
The Court cautioned companies, saying “technology companies that demand specific court orders despite being provided with a Grant of Administration or Grant of Probate providing for power over digital assets together with these reasons should not be surprised if they are met with significant costs penalties”
The Court threatened solicitor and client costs to “risk-averse technology companies” who demand “duplicative” orders as a condition of doing business with estate representatives. If a technology company did not require a court order to deal with a deceased during their lifetime, it cannot require a further court order to deal with the administrator of the deceased’s estate.
Key Takeaways
Legal Trends
Traditional estate plans may not include contingencies for digital assets, access to email and social media accounts, online banking or cryptocurrency wallets. Without clear legislation or judicial commentary, conservative technology companies may ask for precise court orders specifically identifying the digital assets over which a personal representative may be granted access. These processes protect the technology companies from disclosing personal information to bad actors, but can overwhelm the courts with procedural applications and burden administrators with further tasks.
The Court’s decision follows a 2024 report by the Alberta Law Reform Institute which recommended new legislation to confirm that the existing powers of fiduciaries in Alberta, such as estate administrators and executors, extend to digital assets. The report identified that digital assets are often governed by restrictive service agreements that limit access to the original account holder, and that issued arise when third-party fiduciaries tasked with managing an individual’s digital assets are denied access by the service provider. Such denials are time consuming and labour intensive to overcome for a personal representative.
The legislation recommended by the Alberta Law Reform Institute had previously been proposed and outlined by the Uniform Law Conference of Canada, which recommended in 2016 that provincial legislatures adopt legislation giving fiduciaries clear authority to access, control and copy digital access and accounts.
Implications for Technology Companies
Technology companies may wish to review their policies and procedures when interacting with estate administrators, and multinational actors may want to familiarize themselves with the estate administration processes and requirements in various Canadian jurisdictions.
The Court strongly hinted that solicitor and client costs may be awarded against technology companies which require estate administrators and executors to obtain further court orders after obtaining a Grant of Administration. Solicitor and client costs can total in the tens of thousands of dollars for even a straightforward application, depending on the circumstances giving rise to the application and the complexity of the matter. Technology companies may find that the risks of cost consequences outweigh the privacy risks and considerations which their terms of service and policies seek to address.
Implications for Estate Representatives
The Court invited estate administrators and executives to use the reasons set out in Wada Estate (Re) to explain the law of Alberta to technology companies which ask for tailored court orders before granting access to a deceased’s personal information and accounts. The strong language in this decision should provide estate representatives with a useful tool to raise if asked to obtain an order for the delivery of digital assets.
It remains to be seen whether the legislature of Alberta, and the legislatures of other Canadian jurisdictions, will ultimately follow the recommendations of the Unform Law Conference of Canada and enact legislation to address this issue. In the absence of such enactments, decisions such as this will promote efficiency in estate administration and help to allocate judicial resources to more contentious matters.
For more information on this topic, please contact Mitch Bringeland or other members of the Dentons Privacy and Cybersecurity group.
