Memorialization & Legacy Policy

1. The basic model

A ForEverAfter profile is intended to remain the same person's canonical identity record even when it appears in multiple family branches. Linking a profile to another family branch does not create a new copy that another person owns.

While a person is alive, that person controls their own claimed profile subject to the Terms. A user may provide a unique handoff identifier or designate a Legacy Contact, Branch Custodian, and ranked fallback custodians for post-death placement.

2. Discovery, linking, and custody are different

Discovery means another user can find or encounter a profile through permitted family connections. Linking means a relationship edge or family-tree placement is created. Custody means a permitted account maintains the canonical profile on a family branch after death. None of those concepts automatically gives ownership of the person's content or estate authority.

A profile may remain discoverable through an existing family graph even when the person chose not to allow new family links after death. Discovery alone does not create a new relationship edge, custody, editing authority, or ownership.

3. Legacy Contact and Branch Custodian

A Legacy Contact is a person designated to receive the deceased person's canonical profile into a family branch after death when the required handoff and verification steps are completed. A Branch Custodian is permitted to house that canonical profile on their branch. A Fallback Custodian is the next ranked designated person if the primary person is unavailable or declines.

These roles do not make the recipient an executor, personal representative, owner, heir, beneficiary, or holder of the deceased person's intellectual-property or publicity rights. They do not authorize rewriting the deceased person's authored profile.

4. Unique-ID handoff

When a user voluntarily gives a unique handoff identifier to a designated person, that credential is evidence of the user's intended product handoff. After death is verified and the receiving ForEverAfter account is authenticated, the designated person may accept or decline custodial placement.

If the designated person declines or does not act, the canonical profile may remain memorialized without an active branch custodian until an authorized fallback or other permitted process applies.

5. Death verification standard

ForEverAfter uses a layered verification approach rather than relying on a single private death database. Memorialization ordinarily requires one strong source or two independent corroborating secondary sources.

Strong evidence may include a certified death certificate or reliable image of one, an official government death record, coroner or medical-examiner record, funeral-home statement, or court or probate document. Secondary evidence may include an established funeral-home obituary, established newspaper obituary, public memorial notice, or another independently verifiable source that matches the person's identity.

Custodial transfer to a predesignated Legacy Contact generally requires strong proof of death plus authentication of the designated recipient's ForEverAfter account. When there is no predesignated recipient, we may require strong proof, identity or relationship evidence, secondary corroboration, and manual review before permitting a sensitive custodial change.

6. Verification-document minimization

Please redact Social Security numbers, unnecessary medical details, cause of death, unrelated account numbers, and unnecessary home addresses from death-verification documents before submission when possible.

ForEverAfter intends to retain raw verification documents only as long as reasonably necessary for verification, a related dispute, or a legal hold. We may retain a limited record that the death was verified, the method, the date, and the review result.

7. What other users see

Memorialization is not intended to replace the person's profile with a custodian-owned page. To ordinary viewers, the canonical profile generally remains the same record, subject to the person's audience settings and any lawful restrictions, with memorial status and a death date or related memorial information added where appropriate.

Custodial information is primarily an administrative and graph-management concept. A custodian does not become the author of the deceased person's memories.

8. Family-link preferences

When the feature is available, users may be able to control whether relatives can discover them through family connections, whether relatives may request relationship links, and whether verified relatives may request post-death placement when designated custodians are unavailable.

ForEverAfter may offer post-death preferences such as appointees only, verified relatives may request links, broader relationship proposals subject to verification, or no new family links after death. Posthumous placement by a non-appointee should not be assumed merely because a person claims to be family.

9. Disputes

If credible people dispute a custodial transfer, relationship, death verification, or claimed authority, ForEverAfter may freeze the disputed custodial action while leaving the canonical memorial available under its existing visibility settings where appropriate.

For ordinary family disagreements about memories, ForEverAfter may preserve multiple attributed perspectives rather than adjudicating personal history. A court order, legally recognized fiduciary authority, verified pre-death instruction, or other legally controlling instrument may override a product-level designation where applicable law requires it.

10. Memorial storage and payment

A person's death does not automatically cause deletion simply because recurring payment stops. If the memorial archive remains maintained through an authorized paying family branch, it may remain actively available through that branch.

When no paid or active branch is maintaining a memorial archive, ForEverAfter may keep the lightweight canonical profile and graph information active while moving media or other heavy data to archival, offline, or cold storage. Restoration may take time and may require an eligible family link, custodial action, or then-current storage plan.

This archival approach is a preservation strategy, not a guarantee of perpetual storage. ForEverAfter may change storage providers and storage tiers, and extraordinary legal, technical, financial, security, or business circumstances can still require migration, restriction, export, or deletion.

11. Four-generation display and deeper records

The product may limit the number of family generations displayed at one time for usability even when deeper ancestral records remain connected in the graph or archive. A display limit does not necessarily mean older connected profiles have been deleted.

12. No estate-planning effect

Legacy Contacts, Branch Custodians, handoff identifiers, memorial preferences, and family-tree settings are ForEverAfter product permissions. They do not transfer money or property, create a will or trust, appoint a legal fiduciary, or determine inheritance. Use legally effective estate-planning instruments for legal transfers or appointments.

13. Contact

Use the Legal Contact page for death verification, disputed memorial status, custodial disputes, identity challenges, or other memorial and legacy requests.