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> They are “de-identified” from the lab info, but dna can’t be truly deidentified because it’s dna. DNA is not just random numbers. You can reconstruct the who
by threatripper 5y ago
> They are “de-identified” from the lab info, but dna can’t be truly deidentified because it’s dna.
DNA is not just random numbers. You can reconstruct the whole family tree from just DNA samples. With DNA samples of the whole population we could reconstruct the family tree of the whole nation alive and even some generations back. Add in some DNA samples associated with medical records and you can use this to predict the probability genetic disorders. The more data points you can connect to this structure the less anonymous it becomes.
The key is to get DNA from a majority of the population to close the gaps in your relationship network.
- captainredbeard 5y agoThen what?
- dekhn 5y agoin the good universe, they use that information to make drugs that are better-tailored to people's population-specific genetics (one type of "personalized med") in the bad universe, they give it to an ad agency that then beams ads for the wrong medicine into your retina 24/7
- ThePowerOfDirge 5y agoSeems like you have a very firm grasp of what can and cannot be done with a person's DNA.
- dekhn 5y agoYes? I got a phd in biophysics, studying the structure and function of DNA, and have donated my genome to science (publicly available for anybody to analyze).
- captainredbeard 5y agoUnfortunately, I can imagine worse "bad universe" cases than that. Pandora's box. Just because we can does not mean we should.
- olouv 5y ago