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Privacy and Your Ancestry – The Implications of Sharing Data

  1. Your DNA;

  2. DNA of a person for whom you are a legal guardian;

  3. DNA of a person who has granted you specific authorization to upload their DNA to GEDmatch.com;

  4. DNA of a person known by you to be deceased;

  5. DNA obtained and authorized by law enforcement to either: (1) identify a perpetrator of a violent crime against another individual; or (2) identify remains of a deceased individual;

  6. An artificial DNA kit (if and only if: (1) it is intended for research purposes; and (2) it is not used to identify anyone in the GEDmatch.com database); or

  7. DNA obtained from an artifact (if and only if: (1) you have a reasonable belief that the Raw Data is DNA from a previous owner or user of the artifact rather than from a living individual; and (2) that previous owner or user of the artifact is known to you to be deceased).

GEDmatch.com can change the policy at any time. 

On the one hand, it’s pretty cool that murderers and rapists can be brought to justice, and families can get closure on their missing loved ones. On the other, I never agreed to put my DNA in a law enforcement database—but now snippets of it are probably already there thanks to a third or fourth or fifth cousins who had no idea their Ancestry file or 23andMe file would ever be used this way.

Serving justice and getting closure for families on their missing loved ones is a noble cause.  However, what if a person never agreed to put their DNA in a law enforcement data base?  Some have lost control of that right due to distant relatives however….  

So, what are the take aways when it comes to maintaining privacy?

  1. Privacy and ethics are very complex and there are many sides to this coin

  2. Action of others may lead to consequences to you which you may not have considered

  3. Sharing data can have unintended consequences

  4. Read the legal language

  5. If a government structure or fabric of society changes, all the information available on each of us can be used in a multitude of ways

  6. Algorithms and correlations will only get more and more sophisticated

  7. Just as in the book/movie Minority Report, where suspects are arrested BEFORE they commit the crime – we can get close to that being a possible reality with technology advancements! 

  8. Be an educated consumer and mind what you put in the public domain.  It can affect you and those around you.

If you want to find out more about privacy and how Vaporstream can assist you with gaining more control over your privacy, contact us or ask to see Vaporstream in action.

 Contributor: Galina Datskovsky

*** This is a Security Bloggers Network syndicated blog from Vaporstream authored by Tali. Read the original post at: https://www.vaporstream.com/blog/privacy-and-ancestry/