This article addresses concerns about DNA information privacy, following news that DNA data from a genealogy website was used by police to arrest the man believed to be the Golden State Killer, Joseph James DeAngelo; it discusses the different contexts of DNA testing, the familial DNA search that led to the police capture of DeAngelo, the history of DNA profiling and its use of statistics, and DNA sequencing database crosstalk.
This article discusses the overlap of two aspects of modern law enforcement and criminal justice concerns: information privacy and the use of DNA information to identify and capture suspects in criminal investigations. The article uses the example of the arrest of Joseph James DeAngelo, who was identified as the Golden State Killer that was responsible for at least 12 murders and more than 50 rapes from 1976 to 1986. It notes that while genealogy companies say they will refrain from posting DNA information unless compelled to by a court order, consumers do not share the same privacy constraints; it also notes that it is currently possible to identify a person by comparing the short DNA repeats tracked in forensic genotyping to the same genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers that form the basis of many health and genetic-trait tests. The article reviews the history of DNA profiling, modern genetic testing company goals and practices – from identifying long-lost relatives to identifying genetic health risks and performing clinical testing, and the power of DNA profiling and the use of tools such as the FBI’s Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) that shares DNA profiles among crime laboratories. Two case studies examined in this article are that of the Golden State Killer, whose arrest was aided by information from a consumer website called GEDmatch, to the 2013 case of Alonzo Jay King who was arrested in Maryland. It also considers threats to genetic privacy through the example of the 1000 Genomes Project database, and it highlights how crosstalk between consumer DNA test sites and forensic investigations can go both ways – that DNA information collected by sites such as 23andMe can now be matched against the information in CODIS or other governmental databases.