Dashlane's Emergency feature allows you to designate someone who can request emergency access to your data. For each contact you add, you decide which of your passwords and Secure Notes you wish to share. When a request is made, you can approve or deny their request. And if you are unable to respond, you define how long they must wait before being given emergency access.
To set up the feature, we encourage you to carefully follow the instructions below. You may also wish to invite your contacts to read the instructions for How to become an emergency contact.
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Sending and setting up your request
The screenshots below are for the Windows app, but the process is identical on your Mac.
Add a new contact
To add an emergency contact, go the Emergency section of your desktop app and click on the Add new button.
Enter an email address
Under "Emergency contact," enter the email address of the person to whom you wish to send your request. Should you wish, you can send requests to multiple addresses at the same time.
Though your Emergency contact does not need to be a Dashlane user at the moment you send them your request, they will need to create a Dashlane account and accept your request within their Dashlane app.
Set a waiting period
The waiting period is the amount of time you will have to decline a request before it is granted automatically. The default waiting period is two days, though it can be set from zero to two months.
Note that if you set the waiting period to "Require your response," access will never be granted unless you explicitly accept the request.
Advanced settings
By default, your emergency contact is given access to all of your passwords and Secure Notes. Receipts, Payments, Personal Info, and IDs are not included in the Emergency feature.
Should you wish to limit the access to a specific list of items — even just one, click on the Advanced button at the bottom of the new contact pop-up.
Add each new item in the "Emergency items" field. You can search for each item by typing their names, and select them from the search results.
You can always add to or edit the list later, once the contact has been set up this way.
Sending the request
Once you click Next, you are asked to provide your name as you want it to appear in the request email, and can include a message for your contact. Click Send, at which point you will need to enter your Master Password.
Note that when you specify your name, please do not use special characters. In the example below, the umlauts in "Hans-Jürgen Bäcker" will produce an error. If you used special characters and get an error, please click on Previous then Next, remove the special characters, then click Send again.
What your contact needs to do
Once you click Send and have entered your Master Password, the invitation will be sent to the specified email address. In your Dashlane app, the invitation will appear as pending until it's accepted by your contact.
Your contact will receive a message both by email and in-app.
Remember that if your contact is not currently a Dashlane user, they will need to create an account. For the feature to work, your contact must accept the request on their Emergency page in Dashlane. If your contact does not use Dashlane, and does not formally accept your request, they will not be able to access your data.
Logging back in
To ensure the process has been completed, you need to log out, then log back in to Dashlane at least once.
Your Emergency contact will now be able to request access to your data.
What happens when a request is made
When an Emergency contact requests access to your data, you will be notified by both an email and an in-app pop-up message.
If you are available to respond, you can Grant access or Decline access as you see fit.
If you are unable to respond, your contact will be given access after the designated waiting period.
Revoking access and removing a contact
You can revoke Emergency access at any moment, even if access was already granted. If they want or need access again, they will need to submit a new request.
To do so, click on the minus icon on the right side of the contact, and click Lock emergency access. If you wish, you can also directly click Remove contact to lock their access and remove the contact entirely.
