DNA Testing in the News Again

I have posted a few times about the debate occurring, largely in the United States, about the use of Genealogical DNA databases by law enforcement.  Allowing police access, with or without search warrants, to the genealogical DNA databases held by the likes of Ancestry, 23andMe, Family Tree DNA and GEDmatch is creating a great deal of uncertainty.  I have been following several posts by The Legal Genealogist Judy Russell about this issue and the legal mess it is creating.  To read Judy's latest post, click here.

The latest issue rises from the disclosure by the New York Times on Tuesday that a Florida judge had issued a search warrant for the GEDmatch DNA database.  Originally GEDmatch had allowed law enforcement open access to upload DNA from crimes.  In April 2018, GEDmatch's privacy statement said it "exists to provide DNA and genealogy tools for comparison and research purposes." The statement said that this, "by its very nature, requires the sharing of information. Because of that, users participating in this site should expect that their information will be shared with other users."  In May 2019, GEDmatch began requiring people who had uploaded their DNA to its site to opt in to allow law enforcement agencies to access their information.  That warrant issued in Florida overrode the privacy settings of GEDmatch users and opened information to police scrutiny even if the users had chosen not to allow police access to the data.

Currently GEDmatch is one of the smaller fish in the Genealogical DNA ocean, with a database of approximately 1 million users.  DNA policy experts have said the development was likely to encourage other agencies to request similar search warrants from the big fish like 23andMe, which has 10 million users, and Ancestry.com, which has 15 million.

It is important to remember that not all Genealogical DNA sites are alike. GEDmatch and Family Tree DNA make it possible for anyone to upload his or her DNA information and start looking for relatives. Law enforcement agents began conducting genetic genealogy investigations on these sites not because they were the biggest but because they were the most open.  By contrast, Ancestry.com and 23andMe are more closed systems. Rather than upload an existing genetic profile, users generally send saliva to the companies’ labs, and then receive information about their ancestry. For years, fearful of turning off customers, Ancestry.com and 23andMe have been adamant that they would resist giving law enforcement access to their databases.

Now that a legal precedent has been set allowing the GEDmatch privacy settings to be overridden, will it be easier for law enforcement to gain access to any of the Genealogical DNA databases?  And given the success of accessing GEDmatch to help solve crime in America, how long will it be before law enforcement in other countries try testing the water to see what they can access to assist in their own crimes?  Suddenly the glow of finding my family's ethnicity and distant cousins using DNA is fading as wider implications become obvious, and no solutions to the issues seem to be in sight.