Not everything is death
Most emergencies are not the final one. You are in hospital and someone needs your insurance details. You are unreachable for a stretch and someone has to keep things running. LifeWyn treats these as different situations from death, and opens a different, smaller amount of your vault for each — because a broken leg should not disclose your entire estate.
There are two ways a limited amount can be reached while you are alive, and a separate, fuller disclosure that only follows a verified death. It is worth setting up the first two before you need them.
Break-glass: access you pre-arrange and control
You can set up break-glass access for a specific trusted person: you choose exactly which categories of your vault they may open, you set a code they will need, and you can require a waiting period before it takes effect. When the moment comes, they use a link and the code to open only what you allowed — nothing else.
It is built to resist misuse. Repeated wrong attempts lock it, you are notified when it is used, and it cannot be used at all if a protective hold is in place on your account. The scope is yours to decide: you might expose insurance and key documents while keeping crypto, finances and personal messages closed.
Incapacity: pausing the switch, without triggering inheritance
If you are incapacitated or missing rather than dead, that state can be recorded, and a representative — someone acting for you under a power of attorney, a medical guardian, or a temporary steward — can be noted. Doing so pauses your check-ins so they do not escalate toward a death conclusion while you are simply unable to respond.
This is the crucial part: incapacity does not trigger inheritance. It pauses the machinery and permits a limited, verified representative to act. Your nominees do not receive your estate because you were in a coma; they receive it only after a verified death.
Verified incapacity opens only a limited set
Where incapacity is formally verified, LifeWyn can open a limited set of categories — the practical and financial essentials that someone genuinely needs to look after you — and never the full estate. The rest stays sealed under exactly the same encryption as before.
So there are, in effect, two verified levels while questions of life and death are unresolved: a limited opening for an incapacity, and the full disclosure that waits for death. There is no separate hidden tier beyond these.
Death: the full disclosure, and only then
Full inheritance — the complete set of what you left for each nominee, on the terms your rules set — is released only after a death is verified through the process described in the Life Signals guide. Every gate along the way fails closed, and a protective hold by our team stops even a verified release while a concern is being looked into.
The effect is a staircase, not a switch. A hospital visit opens what you chose for it; an incapacity opens a limited set and no more; a verified death opens the rest, in the order and to the people you decided in advance.
Questions people ask
- If I'm hospitalised but not dying, does my whole vault open?
- No. A hospital or incapacity situation opens only a limited set — for break-glass, exactly the categories you chose in advance; for a verified incapacity, a limited essentials set. Your crypto, finances, property and personal messages stay sealed. Full inheritance follows a verified death only.
- Can I decide exactly what an emergency contact can see?
- Yes, for break-glass access: you pick the categories they may open, set a code, and can add a waiting period. They can open only what you allowed, and you are notified when they do.
- Does declaring me incapacitated give my nominees their inheritance?
- No. Incapacity pauses your check-ins and lets a verified representative act within limits. Inheritance is triggered only by a verified death, never by incapacity.
Related
Sources
- How LifeWyn works — LifeWyn, checked 2026-09-14
- Security at LifeWyn — LifeWyn, checked 2026-09-14
Describes how LifeWyn works, at the date of last review. Product behaviour changes.
Cite this
LifeWyn editorial team (2026). Emergency Access: What Unlocks, When, and What Stays Sealed. LifeWyn, v1, last reviewed 2026-09-14. https://www.lifewyn.com/guides/emergency-access-what-unlocks-when