23andMe just sent out an email trying to trick customers into accepting a TOS change that will prevent you from suing them after they literally lost your genome ro thieves.
Do what it says in the email and email arbitrationoptout@23andme.com that you do not agree with the new terms of service and opt out of arbitration.
If you have an account with them, do this right now.
Here’s an email template for what to write: https://www.patreon.com/posts/94164861
Agreed unfortunately. An important thing in US law that people often don’t know is that in most cases, you need to prove that you were damaged in some way. Unless the company broke a specific law, you probably just have to accept it until you have problems relating to identity theft. And even when that happens, you’d still need to prove that the the attacker used the lost 23andMe data.
I personally don’t understand why people use these services in the first place. Let’s all let some private company that we know nothing about build an absolutely massive database of people’s DNA. And let’s voluntarily do it and even pay them for that “service”. Sure, that sounds like a good idea. What could possibly go wrong? Hope your minor curiosity was worth the massive privacy invasion.
In my case, I went through 23 and Me because 75% of my DNA comes from sources unknown. No idea who my father was or my maternal grandfather. So being able to fill in those gaps as well as helping to determine medical risk has been very useful.
Building a massive collection of DNA is a really good thing from a research standpoint. Plus, it’s helping solve a bunch of murder cold cases.