DNA Tests — Mostly Harmless

“Mostly Harmless” died in a yellow tent about a thousand miles away from where he started hiking the Appalachian Trail. (Mostly Harmless was a trail nickname given to the unidentified man) There was no indication of foul play, but even after two years detectives are still unable to contact the family, because no one knows who he is. He had no cell phone, wallet, or ID of any type. The only clue left on his body to identify him was the body itself: DNA. His DNA was recently submitted for analysis by GEDmatch, a small DNA analysis company most famous for helping to identify the Golden State Killer. So far, no close matches have been found. Mostly Harmless’ case is one where access to millions of DNA results would be helpful to identify someone, but what are the unintended consequences of having millions of people’s DNA stored in a database? Should the government and law enforcement have access to these databases to help them solve crimes? What if the database got leaked? One privacy concern is that, even if you don’t submit your DNA for analysis anywhere, if any close relative does its almost the same as if you had. Because most of their DNA is also your DNA. I think sending in your DNA for analysis by AncestryDNA or 23andME has some amazing benefits from genealogy to understanding family health problems, but it doesn’t come without risk, some of which we might not even be aware of yet. So I wouldn’t call it harmless, just mostly harmless.