DNA testing is a booming global business enabled by the internet. Millions of people have sent samples of their saliva to commercial labs in hopes of learning something new about their personal health or heritage, primarily in the United States and Europe.
Industry giants Ancestry.com, 23andMe, MyHeritage and FamilyTreeDNA market their services online, share test results on websites, and even offer tutorials on how to search for relatives in phone directories, or share results in social media. They often also claim rights to your genetic data and sell access to their databases to big pharmaceutical and medtech companies. It’s part of a worrying trend of corporations to acquire personal data about people and act in their best interests, not yours.
The Pentagon has advised military members to avoid using take-home DNA kits because of concerns about “unintended security consequences and increased risk to the joint force and mission.
Some things to consider;
* DNA tests can’t be anonymous. Your DNA is an unique marker of your identity that could be mishandled no matter what.
* You will jeopardize the anonymity of family members. By putting your own DNA in the hands of companies your (known or unknown) relatives could be identifiable to others, possibly against their wishes.
- A pair of socks is a better gift. You may be tempted by special offers around holidays such as one, offering 30% off genetic tests for Father’s Day. Consider that dad might not want to be part of a commercial science experiment.
- You will become the product. Your genetic code is valuable. Once you opt in to sharing, you have no idea what company gets access to it, nor for what purpose.
- Big pharma wants your DNA. 23andMe revealed a $300 million USD deal with pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline in 2018 that gives them access to aggregate customer data. Calico Life Sciences, a medtech company owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet, is the primary research partner of Ancestry.com.
- Genes can be hacked. Scientists have discovered how to store data and even animated GIFs in DNA, and even believe malware could be placed in DNA to compromise the security of computers holding databases. Still trust them?
Companies do what they can to strip away personal information from the genetic codes, but anyone who has been the victim of credit card fraud or identity theft know that anonymizing data is far from foolproof.
In today’s world, you cannot promise people absolute confidentiality. Why would you voluntarily give more of your personal information to a company that is owned by the parent company of Google, (Alphabet)?