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The recent use of DNA-based ancestry sites' genealogical data to solve cold cases would suggest we're not far off. [1]: https://www.newscientist.com/article/21

The recent use of DNA-based ancestry sites' genealogical data to solve cold cases would suggest we're not far off. [1]: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2167554-serial-killer-suspect-identified-using-dna-family-tree-website/ https://www.newscientist.com/article/2167554-serial-killer-s... [2]: https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/9kpnnz/linda-ann-okeefe-murder-suspect-arrest-dna https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/9kpnnz/linda-ann-okee... [3]: https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/02/19/maine-man-accused-killing-young-woman-alaska-years-ago/auNFXwgMAsXMmwGGzDLY4H/story.html https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2019/02/19/maine-man-accus...

astura 7y ago
For white people, at least. https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/10/golden-state-killer-genealogy/572545/ https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/10/golden-s... > Then the researchers built a model that predicted that a database needs to include only 2 percent of a population for 90 percent of the people to have a third-cousin match or closer in it. In other words, a database of just a few million people could be sufficient to track down nearly everyone in the United States....Another pattern jumped out in the MyHeritage data: People of primarily northern European ancestry were more likely to have matches than people of primarily sub-Saharan ancestry. This reflects the predominantly white customer base for MyHeritage and most other direct-to-consumer DNA tests. It also means that genetic-genealogy searches by law enforcement are, for now, more likely to succeed with people of European descent. These sorts of identifications actually require a lot of manual work by genetic genealogists tracing ancestry after a potential relative is found in a DNA database. For example, Barbara Rae-Venter lead a team of five people to identify the Golden State Killer. BTW, there's a handy Wikipedia page for a list of suspects identified using the GEDMatch database https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suspected_perpetrators_of_crimes_identified_with_GEDmatch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suspected_perpetrators...

astura 7y ago

For white people, at least. https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/10/golden-state-killer-genealogy/572545/ https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/10/golden-s... > Then the researchers built a model that predicted that a database needs to include only 2 percent of a population for 90 percent of the people to have a third-cousin match or closer in it. In other words, a database of just a few million people could be sufficient to track down nearly everyone in the United States....Another pattern jumped out in the MyHeritage data: People of primarily northern European ancestry were more likely to have matches than people of primarily sub-Saharan ancestry. This reflects the predominantly white customer base for MyHeritage and most other direct-to-consumer DNA tests. It also means that genetic-genealogy searches by law enforcement are, for now, more likely to succeed with people of European descent. These sorts of identifications actually require a lot of manual work by genetic genealogists tracing ancestry after a potential relative is found in a DNA database. For example, Barbara Rae-Venter lead a team of five people to identify the Golden State Killer. BTW, there's a handy Wikipedia page for a list of suspects identified using the GEDMatch database https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suspected_perpetrators_of_crimes_identified_with_GEDmatch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suspected_perpetrators...