Sweet summer child.

Narrator:

They didn't.

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.

It shouldn't take hindsight to read the fine print in your 23andme contract. They straight up told folks, that taking their test meant signing over ownership of your DNA samples to them, for whatever future purpose they had in mind.

Anyone who didn't clue in to the fact that meant they were paying that company to own the rights to their DNA, is an idiot.

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.

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.

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

Siblings and first cousins.

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

I wonder if there was anything in the T&Cs that mentioned extrapolation of data leading to identifying genetic relatives and whether their consent was void on this basis. Or whether this could be grounds for interesting lawsuits from nonconsensual relatives being identifiable from the participants' data.

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

I literally had an econ professor years ago who directly told us "do not take a genetics test". This was before the ACA

The reason was simple. It's information that once a private company gets a hold of it, they will use it to hurt you. Whether it's a drug company that learns you're predisposed to addiction, so better to give you it people around you nice temporary discounts on addictive meds, or an insurance company that learns you're predisposed to cancer, so better to look for ways to deny or drop coverage.

Once these companies know a little bit about your nature, they'll exploit any aspect possible to increase profits.

This was not a progressive/socialist econ professor. Just someone who knows how capitalism works.

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.