Inheriti Deep-Dive Series // 001 : What is Digital Inheritance?
Welcome to the first article in our Inheriti Deep-Dive Series where we’ll be giving you further insight into Inheriti — Safe Haven’s flag ship product — and why it’s so unique.
Inheriti : the only truly decentralized (and totally secure) digital inheritance and private key backup solution in the world.
The Sad Story of Matthew Mellon
We’ll begin with the story of Matthew Mellon.
Mellon was a banking heir who invested heavily in Ripple (XRP) turning an initial $2m investment into well over $1Billion. He had a fabulous lifestyle (luxurious homes, private jet) as well as a wife and young family.
He had it all.
Sadly, he passed away suddenly from a heart attack at the age of 54 … taking his cryptocurrency fortune with him.
Mellon had the foresight to stash his Ripple away across various cold storage devices under fake names in banks across the US.
But, he had failed to do what so the majority of crypto holders also fail to do. He failed to make secure copies of his private keys with clear instructions on how his family could access his crypto wealth after his death.
This is just one example.
There are many, many more news stories regarding the sad tales of individuals who have either lost the private keys to their cryptocurrency wallets or have died suddenly … leaving their families unable to gain access to their crypto wealth that they worked so hard to build.
Why, then, are crypto holders so reluctant to take copies of their private seeds for family members (or other trusted individuals) for safe keeping in the event of their death?
Quite simply, they are fearful that someone else could gain access to their private keys and steal their cryptocurrency.
As we’ll see later in this article, the very thing we love about cryptocurrency — it’s ease of access, storage and transfer — is also its biggest flaw … that is, in the event that anyone gets access to your private keys, they also have access to your crypto.
And that explains the reluctance.
Given this concern over security, how do crypto holders also take copies of their private keys safely and securely so that they can gain access to their crypto again in the event of unforeseen accidents — without fear of their keys falling into the wrong hands?
That answer lies in the creation of a new concept and class of products called ‘Digital Inheritance’.
What is ‘Digital Inheritance’?
Digital Inheritance has resulted from the convergence of three previously separate worlds: Wealth Management, Estate Planning and the relatively new world of Digital Assets.
So what are digital assets in this context?
A digital asset can be anything that can be stored digitally, is uniquely identifiable and that has some kind of value for an individual, family, organisation or society. Examples could include your family photographs, company logos, digital images, confidential documents and even source code.
The Rise … and Rise … of Digital Assets
More recently, digital assets have become synonymous with Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) and Blockchain and the cryptocurrency market has reached values in excess of $2.3T (nearly equivalent to the 6th largest economy in the world — India).
NFTs (‘Non-Fungible Tokens’) have also experienced explosive growth in recent months. These are specific kinds of blockchain tokens that essentially certify a digital asset to be unique and therefore not interchangeable.
Digital assets are now everywhere, and their use and adoption is increasing at an incredible pace.
The value we ascribe to digital assets can also vary enormously — from the sentimental value you attach to your family photos, to the significant financial value attached to your cryptocurrency and NFTs.
However, there has never been a better time for the industry to start talking properly about how this wealth can be protected — safely and securely — for our families and loved ones.
“Not Your Keys, Not Your Crypto”
As we mentioned earlier in the article, the very thing we love about crypto — it’s ease of access, storage and transfer — also happens to be its biggest flaw.
That is, the speed and ease with which they can be created, stored and transferred also makes them extremely susceptible to accidental loss or worse, theft.
Whether you own cryptocurrency or NFTs, you will know that the safest place to keep them is in a “wallet” (hot or cold), and that when you create the wallet you will be given a random set of seed words that is used to generate your private key.
It’s these same seed phrases that can be used to regenerate your private key and recreate your crypto wallet — either by you (in the event of unforeseen circumstances) or by anyone else that has access to those seed phrases.
However, in the event that you lose your private key seed phrases (and your ability to access your crypto wallet is lost for any reason), your cryptocurrency and NFTs will also be lost.
Forever.
There’s no calling or emailing customer services — your crypto will remain in limbo on the blockchain for eternity (or for at least as long as that chain exists).
The sad story of Matthew Mellon is not unique. There are now countless news stories regarding individuals and their families losing access to their crypto.
Whether this loss is a result of hacking and security breaches, theft of physical devices, technology failure, carelessness, misplacement of private keys or death … protecting your crypto is likely to be at the forefront of your mind.
Whether we like it or not, “Not your keys, not your crypto” is a mantra that EVERY crypto holder needs to live … and die … by.
We’ve taken a while to get here, but THIS is what Digital Inheritance is all about.
Digital Inheritance is the method and means by which digital assets (including cryptocurrency and NFTs) can be safeguarded and protected to ensure they can be safely and securely transferred to your family and loved ones in the event of your untimely death.
Introducing Inheriti …
Inheriti is Safe Haven’s flagship product and we’re incredibly proud to say that it is the only truly decentralized (and totally secure) digital inheritance solution available in the world.
Not only does Inheriti ensure that your private keys can be safely and securely passed to your loved ones in the event of your death, but there are various fail-safe mechanisms in place to ensure that no one else can gain access to your keys while you’re still alive.
We’re confident in saying our solution is totally secure. Independent audits by Red4Sec Cybersecurity Services have verified that our solution does not store any private key, secret data or any other critical information on any of our back-end systems and repositories.
We use a combination of blockchain and Hardware Security Module (HSM) device technology (utilizing Safe Haven’s own ‘SafeKeys’) to safely distribute heavily encrypted pieces (literally separate ‘key shards’) of inheritance information to separate cold-storage devices.
Importantly, these unique features mean that you can also use Inheriti as a secure means of backing up your private key data too.
Inheriti therefore solves the two biggest problems facing crypto holders today — that of digital inheritance AND the safe and secure backup of private keys.
We don’t make this claim lightly and in subsequent articles we’ll explain much more about Inheriti and how it works.
Check out our next article in this series - ‘Inheriti Deep-Dive Series // 002 : 7 Reasons to Create a Digital Inheritance Plan’ - coming very soon!
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