How to delete your DNA data from genetics companies like 23andMe and Ancestry
By Erin Brodwin,
Business Insider
| 05. 04. 2018
- Investigators say they cracked the cold case of the Golden State Killer with help from data on a genetics website.
- The investigators revealed that they uploaded a suspect's raw DNA signature — sourced from an old crime scene sample — to a site called GEDmatch.
- The case has raised privacy concerns among people who have submitted their DNA data to similar genetics sites.
- Here's how to delete your DNA and data from 23andMe, Ancestry, and Helix.
The recent arrest in one of California's most infamous serial-killer cases was based in large part on a DNA sample submitted to a genetics website by a distant relative of the suspect.
If that news has you concerned about the security of your own genetic material, you may be wondering how to delete it from genetic databases kept by popular genetics testing companies like 23andMe and Ancestry.
Those two databases were not used by investigators to track down Golden State Killer suspect Joseph James DeAngelo. Instead, investigators used a service called GEDmatch, which lets customers upload a raw DNA signature. Investigators...
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