Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/12/10/23-and-you.html
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I wonder how many people have reconsidered becoming anonymous sperm or egg donors now that it’s become so much easier for laypeople to reconstruct their genetic lineage through these services.
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My Son did a DNA test, then came a lot of questions regarding lack of accumulated gene pool data. I started with 2 World Wars, the murder of our family members in both, and then how that left 1 human with our direct DNA, his Grandfather, my Father, me, and him, the last direct descendant in the line.
Conclusion: You’re the last of us, no pressure, but it might time to get married and have a baby…
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If you’re going to do one of these DNA tests from any company, do not use the “social-media”-like aspects that will match you with unknown genetic cousins – at least not until the law is clarified.
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People should submit random samples under random names just to poison the database a bit.
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If anybody doubts that the state Is and will be mining these databases for its own purposes, all the while citing the highest of moral duties to protect the children, today’s tech hearings in the Senate should dispel that:
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thought about it- NO
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yes this plan would be great if every uncaught criminal (or close relation ) would submit dna under one false name that starts with a T and ends with a P.
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They don’t even necessarily need the companies’ permission to use these databases. At least one of the first high-profile serial offenders to be tracked down this way (The Golden State Killer) was caught by investigators who simply set up a regular account under a fake name and sent in a DNA sample to look for matches, just as any layperson could. They even caught some false matches when it turned out more than one law enforcement agency had the same idea.
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As much as I enjoy the My Favorite Murder podcast, holy cow do they have a blind spot for this kind of thing and the privacy issues at play. Which is exactly the wedge the surveillance state uses—no reasonable person could be against catching killers and sex traffickers, right?
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Too late. We might avoid it, but how certain are you that your entire family (including extended family) isn’t all in.
Because mine is, even though I am not. Privacy is officially dead.
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Same here. I’d undo it if I could.
Huh. Now I’m wondering about science fiction stories where someone hacked their genome to avoid matches.
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Don’t cloud his DNA space. There might be a buried paternity suit or two out there.
Submit his DNA under a false name and see if there are markers for anything.
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Anonymous donation has been on the way out for a while now anyway. It’s a terrible thing to do to the resulting human being, making it impossible for them to find out their own genetic history.
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I like how Charlie Stross addressed this in his book, Rule 34. A character had an aerosol can of “Stadium Crowd”, which sprayed the DNA of 50,000 random people around the scene. He also downloaded a phone app that transmitted spoofed GPS signals and left it by his rented cycle so that the record showed he’d been riding it around town.
Apparently people can still commit crimes in the future, but they have to be a lot more skilled than your average Florida Man.
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If you use very very important people it gets easily dismissed.
But, if you use a not so important person who doesn’t have all those agencies with three letters to handle it, then the poisoning gets interesting.
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So many complicating factors… esp. for bone marrow transplant recipients. This is the proverbial tip of the genetic iceberg:
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just deleted two accounts and records. Not trusting these mofos.
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This is why, before going on a caper, I take a vacuum cleaner to the bus station and hoover up a goodly sample of random DNA to scatter in my wake.
Edit: it looks like Charlie Stross beat me to it (@jaded); I guess that’s no bad thing.
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One of the largest population groups in the world that has a unique, immediately recognizable genetic fingerprint is Ashkenazi Jews. Trump is trying to get Jews registered as being a different nationality than ‘Americans’.
You do the math.
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