So, the reason for privacy is because the profit motive of capitalism is not sufficiently restrained as to protect citizens from being abused by corporations?
Be careful you don't break something with those gymnastics.
The immediate concern I had with this story is nefarious groups or individuals purchasing this data to target people with violence based on their ethnicities. Imagine if the genome of millions of Europeans was available on the black market in 1930s Europe.
It’s similar to the Office of Personnel Management data breach when every Federal
Employee was just 0wn3d. It included 21.5 million background investigations into people and the personnel files of every federal employee and most contractors.
Just slightly sensitive stuff. Nobody knows how many people died as a result of the hack, but I’m sure it was non-trivial because a LOT of people got surprised doxed.
This information is still rattling around out there and will have implications for generations.
Imagine if the same could be done for demographics based on genetics — the risk factors for medical conditions, the ethnic ties you’re talking about, etc.
Considering one of the hacker's first actions was to offer for sale data identifying people of Jewish or Chinese descent I think that's a very valid concern.
Did anybody actually buy it though? This could be misdirection, or just misguided marketing based on historical instances of abuse. China isn't known for trying to repatriate descendants, and it's not exactly difficult to find Jews.
Ancestry data would certainly be of interest to a particular demographic known to discriminate by caste. There's no escaping your low-class heritage when anyone can look up your stolen DNA profile on the black market.
Really? As a 25% jew whos genetic data was probably just stolen, I'd like to disagree with that statement. I don't harbour any stereotypical jewish phenotypes, and don't self-identify as a jew, but who knows if someone else decides to do that for me.
It doesn’t matter if it got bought because it’s indelibly available forever now. It’s now available to someone who shouldn’t have it whenever they come around with the intent to misuse it.
And the choice to share or protect this information just got taken away from every one of their customers forever.
I have no idea what "it's not exactly difficult to find Jews" means. It struck me as kind of an icky thing to say, so you might want to clarify the benign intent you had for saying it.
What if you're able to pinpoint unique loci for an individual or group which can serve as a target of a highly specific bio-weapon? Do you think genomic bio-weapons aren't being explored as future weapons?
If a group wanted to do that why bother with the dna data? Easier to just perform the violence. Even in 1930s europe I’d bet the SS would not really be concerned with whatever your dna data said if they really wanted you or your people gone, you’d just be labeled an enemy and sent off same as a jew or a gypsy or a communist.
How do you make the leap to it being an issue of capitalism? There are plenty of bad actors who could use this information (or other hacked info) who are not a corporation seeking profit.
Yeah, I didn't mean 'a philosophical ideal of Capitalism'. Apologies for my imprecise question. I meant Western Capitalism which of course is a form of corporatism.
Governements abuse people more than an economic system ever has. A corporation has never marched people to camps, nor have corporations ever imprisoned anyone for their politics. If I don’t want to deal with a corporation, I have the right not to — unless government forces me to.
> Governements abuse people more than an economic system ever has
This is true on one level, as economic systems are not actors, but abstractions for aggregates of actions; its false on a more concrete level because governments are also not real concrete actors but abstractions for aggregates of real actors.
Both governments and economic systems (and corporations, which you seem to drop in as ig they were the same as economic systems) are abstractions through which real actors act, including to oppress, and very often actions by thr same actors involves all thrre abstractions (even a single action might). Corporations, after all. are themselves creatures of gogernment through law, and economic systems exist only as ideals without being made manifest through legal systems.
> A corporation has never marched people to camps,
You probably don't want to think about most of the best known early joint-stock conpanies (any of the variously East India companies, but especially the British, the Royal African Company, etc.)
> If I don’t want to deal with a corporation, I have the right not to — unless government forces me to.
Corporations—like any individuals—can and do apply coercive force on their own with only after-the-fact review by governments (and, in many cases historically, with obvjecting governments having limited power to apply sanctions), so, no, this isn't correct.
My go-to is "what if literal nazis come to power and use this information to kick-start their eugenics program", but I guess rampant capitalism is also on the threat list.
In Japan there are maps of old caste demographics that are used to exclude categories of people based on where they’re from or their families are from from working - companies have been caught using versions of these maps that are illegal for businesses to use in hiring. They are legal to print or exist without being in use by business.
