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English adapted translationnews item

Beijing court lets mother inherit use rights to 87 game accounts

A Beijing court let a mother inherit use rights to 87 game accounts, without transferring platform ownership or creating a blanket digital inheritance rule.

Back to NewsRead original in Portuguese

Published

July 16, 2026

Reading level

intermediate

Original section

Notícias

Status

English adapted translation, editorially localized.

In synthesis

The Shijingshan District People's Court held that the use rights attached to 87 game accounts had economic value and could pass to the deceased player's mother. The judgment is final between the parties, but it did not transfer ownership of the game or create a nationwide rule for digital assets.

Questions this translation answers

  1. 1What did the Beijing court decide about the 87 game accounts?
  2. 2Does the ruling make every digital account inheritable in China?
  3. 3What is the difference between inheriting use rights and owning the game?
  4. 4How does the case relate to Brazil's digital inheritance bills?

The Shijingshan District People's Court in Beijing held that the use rights attached to 87 game accounts had economic value and could form part of a deceased player's estate. The unnamed game operator was ordered to assist in changing the accounts' real-name registration to the player's mother within 15 days after the judgment took effect.

Neither party appealed, according to reports based on information released by the court. Two qualifications matter: the mother did not receive ownership of the game or the operator's systems, and the ruling resolved one dispute whose case number, full judgment, game title, company and account value have not been made public.

In brief

  • The player, identified only as Gu, died on May 30, 2025, leaving 87 identity-verified accounts.
  • The court treated the contractual use rights as inheritable, not the platform or all of the technology supporting the game.
  • The legal representative of Gu's daughter submitted a written waiver. Gu's father had died before him, and the court found his mother, Chen, to be the only remaining statutory heir to the rights at issue.
  • The user agreement allocated ownership of certain digital elements to the company but did not expressly exclude succession of the use rights after death.
  • The judgment became final because neither side appealed. It is not a nationally binding precedent for every digital account in China.

The dispute between platform ownership and user rights

Gu had created the 87 accounts in a game operated by an unidentified company. After his death, Chen asked the operator to change the registration information so she could exercise the rights associated with them.

The operator initially argued that the user agreement assigned ownership of the account identifiers, virtual items, backend data and derivative information to the company. Gu held only a limited right to use them, it said, and the real-name link made the accounts too personal to fall within the estate.

The decisive contractual point was narrower than headlines about a sweeping defeat for platforms suggest. The agreement allocated certain rights to the operator, but it did not expressly bar the use rights from passing to an heir after death. During the proceedings, both sides accepted that the use rights under the agreement could be inherited, and the court found that position consistent with Chinese law.

The court therefore did not strike down a clause that expressly prohibited succession, nor did it invalidate transfer restrictions across the digital economy. It resolved a particular combination of contract language, account characteristics and family circumstances.

Why the accounts were treated as assets

According to the court's published reasoning, accounts, characters, equipment, virtual items and in-game currency exist as data but can carry both use value and economic value. Gu had invested time, effort and money in developing the accounts, and the associated elements could also have practical and exchange value within the game's ecosystem.

The court found that real-name verification created a personal link but mainly operated as an identity-control requirement. It did not turn the use rights into personality rights inseparable from Gu and necessarily extinguished by his death.

In guidance released with the case, the court distinguished economically oriented virtual assets from social accounts dominated by private communications, personal relationships and third-party information. That boundary is crucial: the reasoning used for game accounts does not automatically give relatives access to email, private messages, cloud photographs or social-media profiles.

What the mother actually inherited

Chen acquired the ability to exercise the account-use rights within the limits of the agreement. The ruling did not transfer ownership of the game, its servers, the platform or any element contractually reserved to the operator.

That distinction reflects a structural feature of the digital economy. Many products users experience as "theirs" are legally forms of access or contractual positions maintained on infrastructure controlled by someone else. Even when a use right can pass after death, its practical value still depends on the service remaining online, the platform's rules and continued technical access.

The viral claim that "China has decided digital games can be inherited" is therefore too broad. The court recognized succession to the use rights attached to 87 specific accounts. It did not rule on every game library, every licensed title or every category of digital asset.

The court applied Articles 127 and 1122 of China's Civil Code. Article 127 instructs that legal provisions protecting data and online virtual property should be followed. It is a general recognition clause, not a complete digital-inheritance regime.

Article 1122 defines an estate as the lawful personal property left by an individual at death, excluding assets or rights that cannot be inherited under the law or because of their nature. The court read the two provisions together and concluded that the economic component of the account-use rights was not legally excluded from succession.

Since January 1, 2026, the Supreme People's Court's official classification of civil causes of action has contained dedicated categories for disputes involving data and online virtual property. The change gives such cases a clearer procedural home, but it does not make every digital asset inheritable or replace the need to examine each contract and account type.

What remains unknown

The available reports do not identify the game, the operator, the accounts' value or the case number. The full judgment could not be found in a public database. There is also no public confirmation that the registration change was completed after the court-imposed deadline.

Those gaps prevent a complete assessment of the judgment and make it unsafe to predict the outcome of cases involving express anti-transfer clauses, competing heirs, shared accounts or large volumes of private communications.

Why the case matters in Brazil

The Chinese ruling has no direct legal effect in Brazil, but the underlying problem is familiar: how to separate assets with economic value from content tied to intimacy, memory and third-party data.

In Brazil's Senate, Bills 365/2022 and 3,053/2026 are moving together. As of July 13, 2026, they were awaiting the appointment of a rapporteur in the Constitution and Justice Committee. The proposals address digital inheritance, the destination of online content and assets, and choices users may record with platforms. They remain proposals, not current law.

The same distinction also matters for Brazilian debates on data protection and personality rights. Succession to an economically valuable account does not remove privacy risks, especially when the same digital environment contains personal data, communications or third-party information. For related context, see Lantyer's English overview on the mosaic theory under Brazil's LGPD and its discussion of platform contracts, image rights and digital identity.

For companies, the case highlights the need for procedures that verify death, identify lawful successors, account for waivers and distinguish one category of content from another. For users, it shows why an organized inventory and formal instructions are safer than simply sharing passwords, which can breach contracts, weaken security and expose other people's data.

What happens next

The judgment is already final between the parties. The operator was ordered to change the real-name registration within 15 days after the ruling took effect, but the available sources do not confirm whether that order has been carried out.

Its wider significance will depend on later judgments, platform policies and any more detailed legislation. The case does not settle digital inheritance. It makes the central conflict unusually clear: users can build value inside accounts, while the infrastructure beneath that value remains under platform control.

References

Key takeaways

  • The mother inherited contractual use rights, not ownership of the game or platform.
  • The agreement did not expressly exclude succession, and both parties accepted during the case that the use rights could pass to an heir.
  • The judgment is final between the parties but is not a nationwide binding rule for every digital asset.
  • Economically valuable accounts require different treatment from messages, photographs and personal data.

Translation note

Adapted English translation from the Portuguese Lantyer article, preserving the limits of the available public sources and avoiding common-law succession terminology where it would overstate the Chinese judgment.

Topics and entities

Digital LawCivil LawTechnology and Succession#Shijingshan District People's Court#Civil Code of the People's Republic of China#Supreme People's Court#Brazilian Senate#online virtual property

Frequently asked questions

Does the ruling make all digital accounts inheritable in China?

No. The case concerned 87 specific game accounts with economic value and no express contractual exclusion of succession for the use rights. Social accounts, private messages and third-party data may require a different analysis.

What exactly did the mother inherit?

She inherited the ability to exercise the account-use rights within the limits of the user agreement. The court did not transfer ownership of the game, servers, platform or elements reserved to the operator.

Does the ruling apply in Brazil?

No. It is a Chinese judgment with no direct legal effect in Brazil. Its relevance is comparative and helps illuminate questions now under debate in the Brazilian Congress.

Should relatives simply use the deceased person's password?

Not as a default. Informal access may breach platform terms, weaken security and expose third-party data. The proper route depends on the platform and governing law.