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One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

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Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#141

Post by dacox »

dangrossman wrote: post #74
apo wrote: post #62

Few people taking theses tests understand or care about the privacy-destroying effect of what they're doing to themselves and their families. For example, this is from the AncestryDNA (different company) terms of service: By submitting User Provided Content to AncestryDNA, you grant AncestryDNA and the Ancestry Group Companies a perpetual, royalty-free, worldwide, sublicensable, transferable license to host, transfer…

> and their families That's how a local cold murder case was solved last year. DNA from a 25-year-old crime scene was run against the samples in one of these genealogy databases, and they found a familial match. Police set up a sting to covertly collect DNA from that person's immediate family. They got their DNA match with a brother's water bottle police took from a trash can after he worked a DJ gig at a school. htt…

They just solved the murder of a child near my house using a technique like this.

My understanding is they asked everyone they could find in a specific ethnic community if they would volunteer a sample for a kind of dna dragnet.

The killer was related to one of the many people sampled.

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#142

Post by Mirioron »

kilo_bravo_3 wrote: post #134
bg24 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I applaud your thinking. But in the real world, things can get ugly very very quickly as the original commenter said. Even worse, imagine your DNA results score being used as part of employment qualification checks! When the greed of $$ is involved, ethics take a backseat in almost all corporate decision making, and good willed but naive persons get trampled.

In the US, it is already illegal for genetic information to be used as a qualification for employment. (a) Discrimination Based on Genetic Information.--It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer-- (1) to fail or refuse to hire, or to discharge, any employee, or otherwise to discriminate against any employee with respect to the compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment of the emplo…

Laws and governments change. They can change radically very quickly. That DNA database isn't going anywhere though.

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#143

Post by barrkel »

kilo_bravo_3 wrote: post #134
bg24 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I applaud your thinking. But in the real world, things can get ugly very very quickly as the original commenter said. Even worse, imagine your DNA results score being used as part of employment qualification checks! When the greed of $$ is involved, ethics take a backseat in almost all corporate decision making, and good willed but naive persons get trampled.

In the US, it is already illegal for genetic information to be used as a qualification for employment. (a) Discrimination Based on Genetic Information.--It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer-- (1) to fail or refuse to hire, or to discharge, any employee, or otherwise to discriminate against any employee with respect to the compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment of the emplo…

You are only thinking about now. Do you think things will be the same in 20 years?

Best of luck.

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#144

Post by tomsthumb »

guntars wrote: post #41
tomsthumb wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s a meaningful difference between the government getting a warrant to look for a specific person’s DNA and searching everyone’s DNA to see if it’s a match. Why should the government get to digitally “stop and frisk” three hundred thousand people because they have a hair sample from a murder scene?

You talk about meaningful differences, but then lump a search in a database with stop and frisk. Either everyone is allowed to use hyperbole or no one is - you can’t have it both ways.

Do you understand the difference between searching an individual you know had committed a crime and searching pool of people that might contain an individual?

No hyperbole needed, and only one way is present :)

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#145

Post by trumped »

module0000 wrote: post #138

If this bothers you, consider fighting back. Submit as many DNA samples to as many firms as you can find. Send each sample from a different [consenting] donor, and ask that they do the same and include you among their donors. This action at scale dirties the data sets of all the companies involved.

right... but almost nobody is going to do that...

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#146

Post by Varcht »

colordrops wrote: post #92
LinuxBender wrote: post #13

The term "At Home" is very disingenuous. Spitting in a tube at home and then mailing your DNA to a lab is not At Home. A proper at-home test would be a kit that allows you to decode your DNA at home without a single strand DNA or byte of data landing on a system that does not belong to you.

How long until this is feasible? I've heard of DNA sequencing machines for $2k, but are not easy or reliable.

I think you guys are onto something. At $100 a pop, my family, just counting out to first cousins, could buy a pretty nice sequencer.

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#147

Post by roscorollo »

kilo_bravo_3 wrote: post #113
apo wrote: post #62

Few people taking theses tests understand or care about the privacy-destroying effect of what they're doing to themselves and their families. For example, this is from the AncestryDNA (different company) terms of service: By submitting User Provided Content to AncestryDNA, you grant AncestryDNA and the Ancestry Group Companies a perpetual, royalty-free, worldwide, sublicensable, transferable license to host, transfer…

>what they're doing to themselves and their families. This only encourages me. My DNA is on record in various places, and if any relative of mine commits a crime I want the honor of being the person who fucked them and sent them to prison. I would tout the event as an esteemed accomplishment. Everyone seems to be worried about a sci-fi movie where clones are made from cheek swabs or corporations use DNA to deny certa…

What crimes would exactly would you be proud to sell your relatives down the river for? Genuinely curious if all acts that can/could be labeled as a crime by the government of the time would count.

There's a fair amount of historical and current laws that have arguably zero moral good; Homophobic, Segregationist, etc.. all around the world.

But alas, There's you cheerily pointing out anyone you can help identify because, it's the law after all.

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#148

Post by aiyodev »

The NSA collects the records of everyone two connections away from a terrorism suspect.

This will allow the FBI to profile the families of criminals. I have a cousin who joined a white supremecist group. Does that mean my life ahould be put under a microscope in case I’m committing crimes too? Should I have to submit to body cavity searches at airports because of her drug convictions?

Our prison system is not designed to punish or rehabilitate. It’s designed to isolate society’s undesireables and put them in a cage away from the rest of us. The Powers That Be would like nothing more than to extend that to entire families.

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#149

Post by empath75 »

kilo_bravo_3 wrote: post #113
apo wrote: post #62

Few people taking theses tests understand or care about the privacy-destroying effect of what they're doing to themselves and their families. For example, this is from the AncestryDNA (different company) terms of service: By submitting User Provided Content to AncestryDNA, you grant AncestryDNA and the Ancestry Group Companies a perpetual, royalty-free, worldwide, sublicensable, transferable license to host, transfer…

>what they're doing to themselves and their families. This only encourages me. My DNA is on record in various places, and if any relative of mine commits a crime I want the honor of being the person who fucked them and sent them to prison. I would tout the event as an esteemed accomplishment. Everyone seems to be worried about a sci-fi movie where clones are made from cheek swabs or corporations use DNA to deny certa…

You’re assuming that every crime anybody could possibly be accused of in the future is legitimate. What if the crime is ‘handed out pamphlets opposing the leader?’

Re: One of the Biggest At-Home DNA Testing Companies Is Working with the FBI

#150

Post by Pharmakon »

kilo_bravo_3 wrote: post #130
mikeash wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about accidental harm because your DNA or a relative’s DNA managed to end up at a crime scene, or bad lab procedures produce a false match?

>Most notoriously, Brandon Mayfield, an American lawyer, was wrongly linked by four fingerprint experts to the 2004 Madrid train bombing. He was arrested and detained for two weeks, before investigators realised that an Algerian man, Ouhnane Daoud, was the real source of the print. https://theconversation.com/fingerprinting-to-solve-crimes-n... Should law enforcement be prohibited from fingerprinting objects found at…

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/10/171005111100.h...

Fingerprints lack scientific basis for legal certainty More research into validity of fingerprint comparisons needed Date: October 5, 2017 Source: Carnegie Mellon University Summary: A new report on the quality of latent fingerprint analysis says that courtroom testimony and reports stating or even implying that fingerprints collected from a crime scene belong to a single person are indefensible and lack scientific foundation.

http://theconversation.com/fingerprinting-to-solve-crimes-no...

Fingerprinting to solve crimes: not as robust as you think

https://californiainnocenceproject.org/issues-we-face/finger...

The main problem with fingerprint analysis is one consistent with many other areas of forensic science: subjectivity. Instead of relying on tested scientific methods, the process is mostly based on the subjective beliefs of the analyst... Despite this subjectivity, fingerprint analysts also typically testify in terms of absolute certainty.

https://issues.org/mnookin/

Fingerprints: Not a Gold Standard

So to answer your question: Should law enforcement be prohibited from fingerprinting objects found at crime scenes?

You tell me.

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