Abstract

In familial searching in forensic genetics, a query DNA profile is tested against a database to determine whether it represents a relative of a database entrant. We examine the potential for using linkage disequilibrium to identify pairs of profiles as belonging to relatives when the query and database rely on nonoverlapping genetic markers. Considering data on individuals genotyped with both microsatellites used in forensic applications and genome-wide SNPs, we find that ~30%-32% of parent-offspring pairs and ~35%-36% of sib pairs can be identified from the SNPs of one member of the pair and the microsatellites of the other. The method suggests the possibility of performing familial searches of microsatellite databases using query SNP profiles, or vice versa. It also reveals that privacy concerns arising from computations across multiple databases that share no genetic markers in common entail risks, not only for database entrants, but for their close relatives as well.

Press Coverage

• You might not be anonymous, thanks to genealogy databases, CNN.
• Police and DNA may threaten privacy, COSMOS.
• The ‘Wild West’ of genetic privacy: New technology enables law enforcement to use DNA from sites like Ancestry.com to track down criminals by finding their relatives, Daily Mail.
• The danger of sharing our DNA in the genetic ‘Facebook’ (in Spanish), El Mundo.
• Family Ties Can Compromise Genomic Data Privacy, New Studies Suggest, GenomeWeb.
• Supercharged crime-scene DNA analysis sparks privacy concerns, Nature.
• Police can now use millions more people’s DNA to find criminals, New Scientist.
• Easy DNA Identifications With Genealogy Databases Raise Privacy Concerns, NPR.
• DNA ancestry searches can now identify most white Americans. Here’s why that’s legally questionable, PBS NewsHour.
• We will find you: DNA search used to nab Golden State Killer can home in on about 60% of white Americans, Science.
• How to Identify Almost Anyone in a Consumer Gene Database, Scientific American.
• Stanford researchers discover a new way to find relatives from forensic DNA, Stanford News.
• ‘We are increasingly exposed’: New studies show how easy it is to identify people using genetic databases, STAT.
• The DNA technique that caught the Golden State Killer is more powerful than we thought, The Verge.
• How your third cousin’s ancestry DNA test could jeopardize your privacy, Vox.
• Researchers Identify Relatives From DNA Data Online, The Wall Street Journal.
• Genome Hackers Show No One’s DNA Is Anonymous Anymore, Wired.