Siblings and first cousins.

Most likely the data 23andme already gathered is enough to narrow down just about anybody in the US.

If we believe 23 and me, they have only recieved 11 data requests for 15 accounts and provided zero data to law enforcement.

23andme.com/transparency-repor…

That is a report on formal law enforcement requests for direct account information. Law enforcement is known to use genetic ancestry, so either they are using other sites or just running the tests themselves instead of doing a formal request.

I couldn't find a case for suing companies, just defense requests to dismiss using the data in court but I might not be using the right search terms.

Transparency Report - 23andMe International

Statistics on the number of law enforcement agency requests for information received by 23andMe.

^{www.23andme.com}

What about the thing I said?

Law enforcement is known to use genetic ancestry, so either they are using other sites or just running the tests themselves instead of doing a formal request.

It's a bit of both from what I gather. I.e. The Golden State killer was caught through GEDmatch and 23AM users have to manually upload their DNA profile to GEDmatch. On the other hand GEDmatch gave unrestricted, undisclosed access to law enforcement to dig throught their database until users started complaining and it became opt-in to allow LE access.

Fun fact, GEDmatch is now owned by Qiagen which operates in around 25 countries. I wonder how many DNA profiles they have access to. I wouldn't be surprised if they've mapped the entire human species to some degree.

Ever see Minority Report?

That, but without the psychics. Insurance companies use things called actuary tables to estimate risk. If they have your DNA, they could decide that, since you have markers for early onset Alzheimer's, they're going to charge you double for life insurance.

Law Enforcement could decide that, since you share some trait with other common criminals, you're more likely to do crime, and get warrants to surveil you more closely. Maybe you don't do crime, but you get pulled in for a crime in the neighborhood because you're the one with the highest crime DNA score, and that's enough to convict you. Maybe you get pulled over more often for going a little over the speed limit, because you're being watched more closely. Maybe they just decide you're so likely to do a crime, they imprison you proactively.

None of this is absurd; it's all been done before. The Nazis used to evaluate people by how big their skulls were - this is Eugenics on fucking steroids, backed by the smell of legitimacy because DNA. People have wrongly gone to prison and served entire sentences because of bad DNA testing, and it's still used.

This should worry you. It's not hypothetical, it's not a conspiracy theory - the potential for abuse of a database like this should concern everyone, liberal or conservative.

Like all those white supremicists who discovered they have black ancestors; only, now, all their little KKK friends know, too!

If the state starts prosecuting DNA crime they’ll just swab people they don’t need a private firm barely anyone’s used to collapse.

Dodgy American insurance firms could try and get their hands on the data no doubt, but Regeneron has to abide by the same data protection rules as 23andme.

The worst part is there is cool, if very boomer dad coded, ancestry research. It however involves reading a lot and lot of bureaucratic documents from hundreds of years ago and attaining quite some fields of knowledge to figure out how names shaped over time, how the bureaucratic institution in $time and $place work and such.

A friend of mine does it and he can trace one root of his family back to the 15th century within like a 30km radius circle. It's really cool to see where, when, and therefore likely why, his family moved about for 500 years to end up where they are now instead of getting "you are probably from europe and 2% neanderthal"

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_J…

Yeah, I would advice against becoming a serial killer for starters.

American serial killer, rapist, burglar and former police officer

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My aunt did this along with posting a bunch of family photos and falling for those quizzes that ask your pet's name or your childhood address. If you have one person like that the privacy of your entire family is compromised.

We told her back around 2010 not to do this kind of stuff, but she's somewhere between "If I have nothing to hide" and "what's the harm?". I hope she gets it now, but we don't talk to her often

People like that doesn't know how much we have to hide.

I don't even want people to know how I wipe my ass, let alone what genes I have.

Exactly, and you cannot hope to see any meaningful regulation out of the current government.

The company will just buy The Secret Service/Trump's Presidential Library a fleet of Rolls Royce and he'll intimidate congress into silence.

23andme was named "invention of the year" by Time in 2008

perfect, I am now openly pro Trump, Zuckerberg and also Putin, all of whom have been named Time Person of the year from 2007 onwards. This is because I don't even bother to understand what Time nominates, but also entirely willing to base very important political or life decisions around this. If you call this out as being incredibly fucking stupid you are victim blaming me. Just because I do not have ever read the magazines nominations of awards that I base my being around does not mean you can attack me for this.

Orphans, people with absent parents, decedents of slaves, the list goes on for folks who would understandably go for an affordable way to access their genetic history.

This is slightly more sympathetic but also 23andme would help you zilch in this scenario because this is not what they do. But I do understand how coming from a vulnerable emotionial position might lead you there.

I'm saddened to see more victim blaming here than anger at the ToS/privacy policy fuckery and a complete lack of consumer protection.

Having said beforementioned, there is 0 consumer protection that would prevent this scenario. This bullshit has to rank among the largest DNA Databse in the world, and, as such, would be the target and has probably been leaked to every major and minor intelligence service in the world since years, even before they just openly sold it off to god knows who. The crux of data security is that while it is a society wide issue, it is also a personal issue. You can't outregulate some idiot just handing over all their data for funsies or SECURITY to whatever entity, to point out the big ones. This holds true regardless of socioeconomic system in place, because the entire point is that it is your data, not anybody elses.

Also, and I do agree I am malding over this, I want to point out that people have been warning about 23andme for a decade for obvious reasons and largely got ignored as being doomer nerds

I didn't get the choice when my easily fooled parents decided it was a good idea.

We tried the 'delete your 23 and me data' but who the fuck knows if that works.

Now some corpos own my DNA probably.

Thanks mom.

It's not about blaming the victims, but correctly identifying what caused the situation and give society at large a better chance of avoiding it from happening again. From not trusting magazines about how secure the new wondertech is, all the way to not reading and understanding the legal paper and agreements they've agreed to.

I don't believe people should be robbed of their agency - You even bring up many good reasons for using 23AM despite being aware of the potential privacy issues. Rather, people should have the information to make a concious choice.

The blame for the situation is with the company. The crucial choice was always in the hand of the users.

i feel saddened that people focus entirely on hindsight but take the current situation as inevitable result of the past, and regard it as unchangeable.

no, this does not have to be treated like any other capitalist asset. if there's a shred of belief that the privacy and dignity of us humans matters to us now in 2025, just get together and disown 23andme, nuke the data, and turn the page.

unfortunately we have to stick harder to the principle of capitalism than any crusader in the middle ages had to stick to the Bible... helpless powerful species

Anyone trusting anyone else in a capitalist society is signing up to be the sucker. Has been this way for 200 years.

Historically illiterate populace.

You're probably affected by this even if you didn't participate.

The thing about genetics is you can make reasonable predictions about individuals if you have data on their relatives. Heck, you can reasonably make regional predictions with genetic data that will be fairly accurate.

If any of your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings, etc took this test, then you are now at least a little exposed.

By 2008 we were well into the "you should know better than give up personal data" era. That is no excuse. People are just stupid and don't care.

There were all sorts of publications telling people to protect their personal information, online and in the meat world by 2001, let alone 2008.

I don't want to victim blame, but going right into this with all the warnings seems pretty stupid to me.

Now what does suck, and horribly so, is that there should be nothing of value gained from that data: there should be laws against nearly everything they could use for corporate advantage, exploitation, identity, etc. With severe consequences.

That is the failure.

I only want to disagree about Facebook not monetizing private data in 2008.

My wife was in politics/campaign management. They were already selling fairly sophisticated targeted ads by then.

I was shocked/terrified by how well they were targeting and it wasn't even close to what they have today.

FUCK CORPORATIONS.

Don't give me that 'hindsight is 20/20', it was the first thought I had when I heard about this.

'How are they going to monetize this?'

Either they sell your data, or they go under and... sell your data.

There was no other option from the inception.

None of this is new, and private companies gobbling up any data they can hasn't been new since at least 2005.

You don’t spend a quarter Bil without knowing what you’re doing. The company is involved in drug discovery.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regene…

American pharmaceutical company

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