The IPhone Is Just The Beginning: FBI Already Accessing Your DNA
By Jake Anderson
ActivistPost.com
MARCH 11, 2016
Private genetic databases like 23andMe and Ancestry.com are increasingly used by people for genealogy tracing and medical diagnostic tests. With a million customers each, the two companies receive a great deal of attention from privacy advocates, who for years warned the government would eventually seek access to citizens’ DNA in order to assist with law enforcement.
They were right, and yet another conspiracy theory becomes conspiracy fact…
It turns out both the FBI and local law enforcement departments routinely seek DNA samples from these companies for familial DNA searches. In fact, according to Ancestry.com’s recently released transparency report, the company received 14 law enforcement requests in 2015. They provided customers’ information in 13 of those cases.
A similar, recently released report by 23andMe discloses there were four law enforcement requests to the company in 2015.
The issue has received increased attention in part because of a frightening article by Wired. The story recounted the legal imbroglio filmmaker Michael Usry endured after Idaho Falls police “matched 34 of 35 alleles” from a crime scene to Usry’s father’s DNA.
Years earlier, his father had donated some DNA to a genealogy project funded by his Mormon church. Ancestry.com purchased the project and made the database of samples publicly available. Though Idaho Falls police ultimately concluded Usry was not involved in the murder of Angie Dodge, they had been able to obtain a search warrant for Michael’s cheek cells based on the sample they found online.
Ancestry.com didn’t realize police would be able to use their information to conduct genetic searches, but as they would soon learn, law enforcement authorities around the country are looking to expand their ability to conduct DNA searches beyond the FBI’s current national genetic database.
The Rest…HERE
