How to unlock an iPhone, iPad or Mac when its owner passed away

Losing someone is a traumatic experience, so you don't want to add to the potential frustration and stress of not being able to access important information or content trapped on their iPhone, iPad, or Mac. But how to unlock an iPhone when the owner has passed away? Here are a few things to try and details about Apple's new Digital Legacy initiative that should make the process a lot easier.

What is Apple's Digital Legacy feature?

At WWDC 2021, Apple announced that as part of its new iCloud+ service, which will replace the standard iCloud subscription in iOS 15, iPadOS15 and macOS Monterey, a new feature called Digital Legacy will become standard (although not directly will be available after Monterey launches - Apple says it will arrive "later this year"). Once it arrives, users can appoint specific users who can request any data stored in their iCloud account to be made available should they die. The process seems straight forward.

1. You can add a legacy contact from your iCloud account.

   

2. In the unfortunate event of your death, that person can then request access to your Apple ID, although a copy of your death certificate is required to show they are eligible.

   

3. When Apple verifies device ownership status, it grants the nominee access to the deceased's information and disables Activation Lock on their iPhone, iPad, or Mac.

Of course, to use this service, you'll need to be running iOS 15, iPadOS 15, or macOS Monterey on your device when it becomes available.

How to access a deceased person's iPhone or Mac device

While we wait for Digital Legacy to roll out, or if you don't have an option to upgrade, you can use one of the following methods to try to recover data from a deceased person's device:

Recover data via iCloud

If you know the person's iCloud account credentials or have access to their iCloud email address, you should be able to use this to recover a large amount of data. If the person concerned has used the service, you will be given the opportunity to download photos, documents, contacts and other files.

1. Go to iCloud.com.
2. Choose Forgot your Apple ID or password? Opportunity.
3. Use iCloud email address to reset iCloud password.

Recover data on iPhone and iPad by restoring an iCloud backup

Another option, which again requires access to the deceased's iCloud account, is to erase their device and restore a recent iCloud backup. The reason for using the recovery method is that you should still have all the data intact but the activation code on your device will be reset so that you can access the iPhone or iPad.

Before attempting this, try to determine when the device was last backed up, as you don't want to erase the data only to find that it was backed up a few years ago. If there's a current one, follow the instructions at Restore an iPhone or iPad from an iCloud or iTunes backup.

What to do if you don't know the deceased person's iCloud data?

Unfortunately, this is probably a likely scenario for many people. All you can do in this case is to contact Apple Support or visit your local Apple Store and explain the situation. Hopefully people there can help you to get access to data stored on iPhone, iPad or Mac.

Of course, when the Digital Legacy feature arrives later in 2021 it should make the process a lot easier, although it will still require the Digital Legacy feature to be set up by the iPhone owner, but until then you'll have to rely on it that Apple can help you through this difficult time.

The key takeaway is to plan for those sad events by figuring out those important passwords in advance. But of course that's easier said than done.

Every death can also have financial implications. So if you decide to switch devices after salvaging the data, read our guides on how to sell your iPhone for the best price, how to sell a Mac and how to sell an iPad.

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