Ancestry.com takes DNA ownership rights from customers and their relatives
By Joel Winston,
Medium
| 05. 17. 2017
A word to the wise: Read the complete terms of service.
Don’t use the AncestryDNA testing service without actually reading the Ancestry.com Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. According to these legal contracts, you still own your DNA, but so does Ancestry.com.
The family history website Ancestry.com is selling a new DNA testing service called AncestryDNA. But the DNA and genetic data that Ancestry.com collects may be used against “you or a genetic relative.” According to its privacy policies, Ancestry.com takes ownership of your DNA forever. Your ownership of your DNA, on the other hand, is limited in years.
It seems obvious that customers agree to this arrangement, since all of them must “click here to agree” to these terms. But, how many people really read those contacts before clicking to agree? And how many relatives of Ancestry.com customers are also reading?
There are three significant provisions in the AncestryDNA Privacy Policy and Terms of Service to consider on behalf of yourself and your genetic relatives: (1) the perpetual, royalty-free, world-wide license to use your DNA; (2) the warning that DNA...
see more
Related Articles
By Joe Mullin, Electronic Frontier Foundation | 08.18.2022
A recently introduced patent bill would authorize patents on abstract ideas just for including computer jargon, and would even legalize the patenting of human genes. The “Patent Eligibility Restoration Act,” sponsored by Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC), explicitly overrides some of...
By Eric B. Kmiec, Stat | 07.11.2022
Twenty-three years ago, the field of gene therapy was bursting with the promise of breakthrough treatments. Then it was almost instantly derailed by the death of an 18-year-old clinical trial volunteer named Jesse Gelsinger after he received a genetically engineered...
Rehua, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
James Wilson, director of the Gene Therapy Program at Penn’s Perelman School of Medicine, is facing claims that he has condoned and contributed to a “dysfunctional toxic workplace.” According to reporters at Penn’s independent student newspaper, it appears that top university officials are protecting him from these charges because his biotechnology companies, worth hundreds of millions of dollars, pay lucrative licensing fees to the school.
Twenty years ago...
By Antonio Regalado, MIT Technology Review | 04.26.2022
The day I spoke to Jennifer Doudna was a tough day: the US Patent Office had just ruled against her university on CRISPR’s most important uses, handing the commercial rights to her rivals at the Broad Institute of MIT and...
