Ancestry dot com?

[Oh_hunnihunni]

I have always been a bit dubious about what companies like Ancestry do with the information and the data vast numbers of customers pay them to take and hold, while giving up all your personal rights to your own genetic makeup, and that of all your relatives in the process.

So is this a good thing? And have you - like my daughter, been tempted into sharing her genetic heritage in exchange for a run down on who her ancestors might have been...

[Lilith7]

I have always been a bit dubious about what companies like Ancestry do with the information and the data vast numbers of customers pay them to take and hold, while giving up all your personal rights to your own genetic makeup, and that of all your relatives in the process.

So is this a good thing? And have you - like my daughter, been tempted into sharing her genetic heritage in exchange for a run down on who her ancestors might have been...

Some of the grandkids gave me one of their test thngys a few xmases ago, so i did the saliva thing & sent it off - nothing. Assuming the inner klutz had struck again i wasn't bothered & did the new replacement they sent...10 times!

Mind you, the final successful result on the 11th try may have had something to do with a few fairly stiff emails the grandkids had sent them..

I found it interesting especially when I realised that among the stuff I already knew about, there was likely to be a Viking or two.

As to the future possibilities, who knows what might be possible, either now or at some future point. The possible uses are somewhet scary - but really no one knows with certainty yet.

[Praktica]

We have a tree on Ancestry, with lots of documents attached, but we haven't bothered with DNA testing.

[king1]

Pros and cons either way... David Lomas makes good use of DNA testing for tracking down long lost relatives, but equally so do the Police

[Zurdo]

I don't know Ancestry what can do with my DNA results that will do me any harm, just one small point in all their data. Google and FB know a shit load more about me, and Stuff wants to know too much about me just to read their website.

Ancestry DNA has blocked me on their site because they want more info...they are not getting it. But it has been very interesting finding out where both sides of my Irish families came from, as records only go back to those who left. Some lost relatives have been found, questions to be answered....if we ever get around to it.

[Oh_hunnihunni]

The data is immensely valuable, and is being sold on to the pharmaceutical industry among others. Which is a good thing, it may enable researchers to devise new therapies that help others, at a massive profit, of course, to the companies themselves.

But the threat that may exist is the use other countries might put that data to. China for instance uses genetic data for all kinds of programmes, including identifying menbers of families belonging to groups they wish to assimilate and control. They also design therapies to tackle disease and illness, and some with less benign purposes to be used in their defence industry. As does America.

It is an interest conundrum for the individual, and for modern nation states and corporations. Especially in these days when cyber wars are well underway between competitors. When health based establishments are targets for just that kind of focus.

All because we are curious creatures interested in our family connections...

[harm_less]

Pros and cons either way...  David Lomas makes good use of DNA testing for tracking down long lost relatives, but equally so do the Police

I have a friend that I flatted with more decades ago than I care to remember that will absolutely not agree to ancestory/genetic testing carried out as the potential for previously unknown offspring turning up out of the blue is a distinct possibility and something he would sooner not leave to change. Another of my old friends has been made aware of a ~40 year old son he has in the UK as a result of a 'fling' during his international employment travels back in the 80s.

The David Lomas scenarios of long lost fathers being cold called advising of them of a potential offspring is all too much "there by the grace of god" situation for my liking so Ancestory.com definitely won't be adding me to their data base.

Insofar as the other implications of personal data risks involved in releasing DNA information to third parties Jemery Rifkin's 190s book The Biotech Century is a real eye opener in this regard and its other potential risks.

[Outsider]

I did the DNA thing through Ancestry (Australia) some years ago but was really disappointed. Learnt nothing of interest that I didn't already know. Waste of money.

[Lilith7]

I like the David Lomas programme, but sometimes wonder how many people they have to turn away because they can't find the relatives.

The net is a double edged sword, able to be used for good or bad, as most things are. I stumbled over an ancestry site years ago which I can't recall the name of now & found a relative looking for members of our family on my dad's side. I eventually made contact which was an excellent move because the person was a genealogist who had been unable to find out particular line & was extremely pleased to make contact at last.
The upshot of it was that eventually she sent us a copy of the family tree which she'd researched back to the 1600s in Scotland.


On the more malevolent side of it though, there doesn't seem to be a great deal we can do to prevent our DNA being grabbed in one way or another - or what might be done with it.
Its the stuff of the scariest sci fi imaginable, & we are the most harmful species on the planet - not the most benign combination.

[Oh_hunnihunni]

Yes. The one species that probably earned its own extinction...

[Lilith7]

Yes. The one species that probably earned its own extinction...

Well - yes. But also no really, since so many are against the worst side of humans, & try to steer the rest of us away from our horribleness.

We're definitely the most weird species.

[Khalin]

I totally agree, if feels weird knowing such info about me goes idk where... Though sometimes I really am tempted to take such a test

[Lilith7]

I totally agree, if feels weird knowing such info about me goes idk where... Though sometimes I really am tempted to take such a test

I'm in the 'my curiosity got the better of me' camp. Once the grandkids gave me the test I was unable to resist...