If someone close to you held Bitcoin and has died or can no longer manage their own affairs, this page is the place to start.
Take your time reading it. Nothing here needs to happen in the next ten minutes, and acting quickly is where most value gets lost.
Before anything else
Do not move any funds. A transfer made from the wrong wallet, or to the wrong address, cannot be undone. There is no bank to call and no transaction to reverse.
Do not type a recovery phrase into a website or an app. A recovery phrase is twelve or twenty-four ordinary words, often written on paper or stamped into metal. Any site that asks you to enter one is taking the coins, whatever it says on the page.
Do not photograph the phrase or store it in cloud storage, email or a password manager. Leave it on the paper or the metal it is written on.
Be careful with anyone who contacts you. Bereavement notices and probate records are public. People read them and get in touch offering to recover crypto for a fee. Nobody can recover a recovery phrase that no longer exists, so an unsolicited offer to do so is a theft in progress.
Secure what is there
Gather the physical objects and put them somewhere only you can reach, such as a home safe or a bank deposit box:
- Hardware wallets, which look like USB sticks or small card readers
- Anything with a list of words on it: paper, a notebook, a stamped steel plate
- Phones, laptops and tablets, still charged and not wiped
- Written notes, letters or envelopes marked with instructions
Do not reset a device, and do not let anyone else reset one. A device that is wiped while the phrase is missing takes the coins with it.
What to have ready
You do not need to know where the Bitcoin is, and you should not go looking for passwords or phrases before we speak. What helps is context:
- Whether a will, a notarised deed or a written instruction exists, and who holds it
- Which devices and papers you have found, without opening or unlocking them
- Whether any exchange or broker sent post or email, since those accounts follow a different process
- Whether anyone else already holds part of the access, which is common in a multi-signature setup
- The name of the notary handling the estate, if one has been appointed
Reach us
Write to [email protected] with the word urgent in the subject line, and say in one or two sentences what has happened and what you have found.
You can also book a call.
We are based in Uccle, Brussels. General enquiries usually take two to three working days, and messages marked urgent are read first.
What we can and cannot do
We can help you work out what exists, what state it is in, and what the safe next step is. We can explain how a wallet, an exchange account and a multi-signature setup each pass to heirs under Belgian succession law, and we can work alongside your notary.
We cannot recover a recovery phrase that has been lost or destroyed. Neither can anyone else. If the words are gone and no backup was made, the coins stay where they are permanently. Saying this plainly at the start is more use to you than a promise we cannot keep.
If you are still deciding what to do, the safest position is the one you are already in. Coins sitting untouched in a wallet are not at risk from waiting a week.