It seems magical, you spit in a tube, ship it off, and a few
weeks later you find out that you’re great grandpa was 1/5 Mongolian, or that
you’re genetically predisposed to hate the sound of people chewing, but have
you stopped to think about what they’re doing with that data? They’re selling
it, and it’s making them a lot of money. A quick peruse through their website
will reassure you that all your “individual level” information is stripped away
when they share information with third parties to “perform business
development” and “improve services” but is that any better?
When you register for their service, there are several privacy
choices you can make, like would you like them to keep your saliva or discard
of it, but you never have the option to say what you would like done with your
information. In fact, they say that by utilizing their service, you are
“consenting to having 23andMe and its contractors access and analyze your
stored sample.” Maybe that’s why pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline purchased
a 300 million stake in the company back in 2018. You are quite literally
spending 100 plus dollars to help a giant corporation make even more money off
your personal information. These companies are fooling the public into thinking
they are some benevolent purveyor of the information, when in reality they are
building vast information data bases.
The Equifax data breach clearly demonstrated that even the
supposedly most secure systems can be hacked. What happens if your entire
genetic profile is leaked? The philosopher Luciano Floridi, in his essay Privacy-
Information Friction discusses a self-constitutive view of privacy asserts
that people have the right to “renewable identity” and DNA is unchanging much
like biometrics. Once something like that is associated with your identity
profile, there is no going back. Your right to freely “mould who you are and
who you can be” has been stripped away. Floridi discusses how the benefits of
biometrics probably outweighs the negatives, but I do not believe the same can be
said about genetic profiles. What if the government comes knocking trying to
implicate you in a crime? Apple said no, but who is to say 23 and me will
follow suit? Just look at the Golden State Killer Case if you’re interested.
Rohan, Your article is interesting to read and definitely makes me think more critically of using services such as 23andme. I like how in your revision you were able to break up the longer paragraphs into some that are a little shorter, but i believe your article still suffers from some minor formatting issues such as longer paragraphs and the one image being used being a very "wordy" picture, which also makes it a bit hard to see clearly. In your revision you were able to connect your argument back to the readings, but the way this was done kind still makes it seem as if your article is not rooted in the readings, but rather has them attached at the end. I believe it would of been beneficial to introduce your argument on the ethics of a "renewable identity" and use this information about 23andme to show how this company is not being ethical. Overall, I believe your revision did improve your article. Nice job!
ReplyDeleteI think your blog post is very interesting. I like how you changed the picture because it gives the reader more information about what 23andMe is. However, the picture is a bit tough to see. I think you could have also mentioned the Floridi reading earlier in the post and then connected it throughout instead of talking about it at the end. I think you did a great job of hooking the reader. I have always wanted to try a service like 23andMe but your post is definitely making me reconsider that. It was a well written post.
ReplyDeleteYour post is very well structured and easy to navigate. I thought it flowed very well. You make a really good argument when it comes to privacy and what these big corporations are doing with our very personal information. I like how you brought up Apple as an example of a company that that isn't bad, but then asked the question would 23 and Me follow suit. You also incorporated Floridi really well talking not only about what he said but explaining who he is as well.
ReplyDeleteHello, Rohan. Thank you for your post! I once become very skeptical about the safety and privacy issue about those kinds of tools. Our personal information may be sold. To improve the post, a larger font would be better. Also, you could include some of your personal feeling about this issue.
ReplyDeleteHey Rohan! I really enjoyed your blog post. I thought you did a great job tying the readings to 23andme. I think bigger text would be very beneficial to your blog post, as it is a little difficult to read. I also think you could use more photos, to break up the text a little bit. Otherwise, the text itself was very easy to read and interesting!
ReplyDeleteHi Rohan, great post! I think you improved the flow of your post in your revision by breaking up your first paragraph. You also added a reference to Floridi's essay this time. I also liked that you added relevant links in your revision. Overall, great edits!
ReplyDelete