The numbers and practical guidance on this site come from different kinds of evidence. This page helps you find the original demographic and technology sources, understand where the Digital After Life Project adds assumptions, and check a provider’s current instructions before acting. Choose a question to see which source can answer it—and which conclusions it cannot support.
Find a source for your question
Select a question above. No details are sent or saved.
What it cannot prove:
A useful next step:
Read all source topics
These original-publisher links work without the selector. If you are offline, the descriptions remain available, but the external sources need a connection.
Where does the worldwide deaths estimate come from?
Start with the United Nations population series and its method. Check the year, variant, unit and whether a value is estimated or projected. The moving counter is a separate calculation.
Publisher: United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division
What it cannot prove: A UN source page is not proof that the website selected the correct annual data row.
The ITU publishes estimates of connectivity. This is evidence about people using technology, not the number of accounts or files left by those who die.
Publisher: International Telecommunication Union
What it cannot prove: A population average should not be silently applied to a deceased cohort.
Apple describes an advance contact arrangement for certain account data after death. The account owner must set it up; restrictions and documentation apply.
Publisher: Apple Support
What it cannot prove: This procedure does not transfer every purchase, passkey, password or protected record.
Google Inactive Account Manager is an account-holder choice about inactivity and selected data. It is not a finding of death or a general entitlement for relatives.
Publisher: Google Account Help
What it cannot prove: Inactive, deceased and living but incapacitated are distinct circumstances.
For a changing population figure, the first useful evidence is the exact published table behind it. Check which edition of the United Nations World Population Prospects was used, which row represents the world, whether the year is an estimate or projection, and the units. Then distinguish that original value from the website’s decision to spread it across seconds. The publisher supplies demographic evidence; the moving presentation is the project’s calculation.
An annual figure also needs a precise identity: the publisher, revision, geography, calendar year, unit, and the distinction between an estimate and a projection. If one of those elements is missing, the source cannot safely be used as though it were an authenticated numerical input. A technical explanation of the calculation is available separately in How the Numbers Are Estimated; this page shows how to trace a claim back to its original evidence.
A link to the UN population series is only a starting point. To interpret a number shown on a website, you also need the original downloaded year, data variant and unit. The source page alone does not show which exact 2026 row was selected or whether that input was tested against the display.
Internet access is not a count of digital possessions
The International Telecommunication Union reports how widely people use communication technology. Its estimates are useful for understanding the spread of internet access across time and regions. But the number of people online is not the number of email accounts, cloud photo libraries, subscriptions, devices or password-reset methods left behind by those who die.
A person may have several phones and email addresses, use a shared device, be counted as an internet user without owning a personal account, or live somewhere with unreliable connectivity. A published percentage for everyone alive in a country also does not tell us the percentage among people who died that year. Age, location, access and changing services matter, and most global datasets cannot observe those private details.
Connectivity figures alone do not say how many digital records belonged to people who died. A digital-trace illustration adds separate assumptions about technology use among those people, records per user, the year the technology became available and how long a record might remain. The ITU’s connectivity tables do not contain those answers.
What we mean by known, estimated and illustrative
Some statements can be checked against a published source: for example, that the World Population Prospects provides annual demographic estimates or that a provider publishes a legacy-access procedure. Other statements are calculations using published inputs, such as the fraction of an annual total assigned to a part of the day. Still others are scenarios that depend on quantities the source does not measure, such as average numbers of online records held by people who have died.
Consider a clearly fictional example. Imagine one thousand people in a study area and suppose four hundred use a particular service. That alone tells you nothing about how many different accounts those people hold, how many people in that group die, or how long their records remain. Assigning two accounts to each person would be a separate scenario choice, not a second statistic supplied by the original study.
Today and Historical ask different questions. Today starts again at midnight UTC and depicts a modeled portion of the day. Historical adds earlier periods and separates records that may once have been associated with people from records that might still exist. Neither concept proves that a file can be recovered, opened or shared.
When the question is about an account, read the provider’s rule
Statistics will not answer whether someone can obtain photographs from an account or how a provider responds after death. In those cases the useful primary source is the provider’s own current documentation, read together with applicable authority and privacy rules. Apple describes a Legacy Contact chosen in advance for certain account data after death; Google describes account-holder choices for inactivity; Microsoft publishes restrictions on sharing account information with non-account holders. These are different mechanisms, not interchangeable forms of inheritance.
Even within one service, the available outcome may be closure, selected-data access, memorialization, an export or no disclosure. A person’s relationship to an account holder is not automatically authorization. Someone assisting a living person should follow that person’s wishes and any valid authority; a representative after death may face different paperwork. Never treat a support article as permission to use a person’s password or to bypass a device lock.
Providers revise products and policies. A guide checked today might be inaccurate when a reader needs it later. For a consequential decision, follow the dated source link, confirm the account type and country, and check the current process before taking a step that could delete material or interrupt an essential service.
Find the original evidence for one question
Use Find a source for your question to choose the kind of claim you want to examine. A result shows a plain explanation of what the source can establish, what it cannot establish and a link to the original publisher. This is a way to read evidence, not a search for a person’s accounts and not a checker that certifies information by itself.
For example, choose “Can someone access an account after death?” The result points to provider documentation, explains that Apple’s advance contact arrangement differs from Google’s inactivity settings and reminds you that rights and restrictions can vary. You can follow the official page and check the instructions that fit the actual account. Choosing the demographic question instead sends you to the United Nations data source, not an unrelated provider help page.
If the interactive selector is unavailable, all source topics appear as ordinary readable cards below it. The cards contain the same source names, cautions and direct links. A person reading a printed copy can also use the named publisher and document title to look up the source independently.
A plausible source can still support the wrong conclusion
A statement may cite a genuine report yet extend it beyond what was measured. A chart of internet users might be used to suggest the same proportion of deceased people left active cloud accounts. An account-help page might be cited to imply that family members can recover every file. Neither conclusion follows from those sources.
A useful check is to ask four questions: who made the statement, what the original source actually measured or promised, which population or account type it covers, and what extra assumption connects the evidence to the conclusion. If the gap cannot be answered, the claim should be narrowed or labelled as a scenario rather than displayed as an established fact.
Sometimes sources appear to disagree because one counts individuals and another counts subscriptions, one covers a calendar year and another a survey period, or one offers an old procedure while another reflects a newer product. Record these differences before deciding that one figure or policy is wrong.
How information on this site should be corrected
If you spot an error, email digitalafterlifeproject@gmail.com with the page title, the exact statement that concerns you, a public source and the date you checked it. Do not include account details or private documents. A clear source-based report is more useful than a general comment that a number looks wrong.
An explanation can change when a better source becomes available, a provider revises its policy or a definition proves too broad. A useful public correction identifies what changed and why, including any uncertainty that still affects the reader. No editorial report requires a password, device code, medical record, statement or death certificate.
A correction to the wording, a check of the underlying data and a test of the displayed calculation are three different kinds of evidence. A revised sentence does not prove a counter is accurate; a newly checked source does not prove a website has loaded the correct row. When reporting a problem, name which part appears inconsistent.
Use evidence without losing sight of the person
Population tables tell us something about scale, not which records any family values or has permission to open. A photograph may matter because it preserves a memory; a monthly charge because it keeps a household service working. This site separates those human decisions from the mathematics so a calculated number is not mistaken for a personal instruction.
Readers may have limited internet access, share devices, depend on someone else to read online instructions or be helping a person whose ability to decide varies from day to day. In those situations, printable notes and trustworthy offline copies can help. Sensitive tasks still need appropriate permission, and an accessible general guide does not replace a provider’s formal decision or legal advice about disputed rights.
Choose a claim you are curious about, follow its original source, and keep only the conclusion the evidence can support. For practical preparation, the guides offer smaller, safer steps that you can decide are relevant to your own circumstances.
Our Approach to Research and Evidence
Reliable public education requires more than collecting sources.
We examine what a source establishes, when the information was published, the population or region to which it applies and whether its conclusions remain relevant.
Where a provider's policy is involved, we distinguish the provider's actual procedures from broader assumptions about account ownership, recovery or inheritance.
Where legal questions arise, we recognize that rights and requirements can vary by jurisdiction, the type of information involved and the authority of the person requesting access.
We also use illustrative models to help people understand the possible scale of digital activity and information associated with people who die. These calculations are educational illustrations, not direct observations of individual lives or complete inventories of digital belongings.
We aim to explain their assumptions, limitations and sources through accessible methods and research materials, while avoiding an impression of certainty that the evidence cannot support.
We do not believe that every question can be reduced to a number. The meaning, accessibility and personal significance of digital information cannot be determined from a statistical estimate alone.
Writing for understanding
Our writing begins with the reader's question.
We seek to explain complex subjects in language that is precise, natural and understandable. We use concrete examples where they clarify an issue and avoid unnecessary technical language, unsupported certainty and repetitive explanations.
We consider what a reader may not know, including unfamiliar terms, hidden assumptions, practical constraints and the limits of their authority.
We do not use grief or fear to encourage unnecessary actions. We do not present one person's circumstances as universal or assume that every reader has the same resources, relationships or choices.
Our standard is that each published resource should help someone understand something important more clearly than they did before.
Questions people ask
Does a link to the United Nations make the moving death counter official?
No. The UN publishes demographic data and methods. A website’s per-second display is DALP’s calculation from selected inputs, not an official live report of individual deaths. The exact input row and version still require independent authentication.
Are the digital-trace numbers counts of actual accounts belonging to deceased people?
No. They are illustrative calculations that require assumptions about technology adoption, how many items might exist and how long some records may remain. Population-level internet-use data cannot identify individual accounts.
Why are provider support pages included with population statistics?
They answer different questions. Population sources help explain broad scale; a provider page may explain a current account process. An account-access decision cannot be derived from the number of people online.
Can I trust a policy that this site checked recently?
A recent check is useful provenance, not a guarantee that a policy is current for every account, place or circumstance. Open the provider’s official instructions at the time you act and check the precise service and region.
Does the source finder look up someone’s accounts?
No. It matches general questions to publicly available evidence and primary guidance. It does not connect to accounts, request names, inspect devices or establish authority to access another person’s information.
Why might one source show a different number from another?
Definitions, units, reporting periods, revisions and populations may differ. Compare those first. A count of subscriptions, for example, should not be treated as a count of people.
What information should I send if I find an error?
Identify the page, the specific claim, and a publisher or document that supports a correction. Do not send passwords, account numbers, private family records or identity documents to a public editorial contact.
Can I use these sources in another country?
International population sources often contain regional data, but many provider and consumer-law instructions vary by country and product. The CFPB and FTC examples here concern the United States. Seek relevant local official guidance where rights or obligations are at issue.
This is an educational source guide, not a live verification service or an account-search tool. Provider rules and legal rights can change by service and jurisdiction.
Further reading and source scope
These references explain the evidence and its limits. Inclusion here does not verify current provider procedures or establish authority in your circumstances.
Annual population estimates and projections, not live reports of individual deaths. Check which edition, year and world-population row supports a displayed figure.
