Post-mortem privacy and informational self-determination

Post-mortem privacy is becoming a vital topic of public and scholarly legal concern. Post-mortem privacy is understood as the right of a person to preserve and control what becomes of his reputation and dignity after death. The assumption that the deceased does not qualify for privacy rights, because his bodily presence has been terminated, no longer holds in our networked society. In the digital age, the phenomenon of the digital legacy that an Internet user leaves behind after his demise, has led to new challenges for the legal system. The deceased is no longer in a position to exercise human autonomy as an active agent. The article reconsiders the notion of human autonomy with regard to these digital representations. Taking the point of view that the control over personal information (also known as informational self-determination) is essential in protecting one's privacy in the antemortem life, the article explores whether this principle may have validity in the postmortem context. Legal philosophical arguments are advanced in a discourse about the quandary if digital personae of deceased persons can be bestowed with a legal basis of personality rights and concomitantly privacy rights. Therefore much attention is given to the problem of the subject, which does not seem to be functioning in the case of the absence of a living subject. Briefly referring to novel personae, it is argued that fundamental human rights need not be limited to the rights of living human beings.