There’s a temptation to compute “1 in a billion” probabilities, have a computer or science wizard process spit them out and for investigators to conclude the person who matches is the one. I’m more worried about the possible lazy or sloppy interpretation and curve-fitting aspects of the tech than I am worried about me flipping out and committing a felony offense.
I am likewise glad for the cases where it is helping to correctly solve crimes, of course.
As to your questions, as far as I know, nobody has ever been murdered in a place where I've been. Maybe on the sidewalk somewhere, but that is not a scenario where DNA is going to be any help, unless the perpetrator leaves behind blood or skin on the victim or the ground. And I've never had sexual contact with anyone who was subsequently raped, nor anyone who didn't already know me for that matter. But it hardly matters whether those things have happened to me personally. What matters is how often that happens in the world, and what fraction of the time this leads to incorrect prosecution.
That depends[1] strongly on what question you are asking. Matching an unknown sample against a small number of suspects is a very different question than searching a database with millions (or billions) of records. The latter is almost guaranteed[2] to return false positives.
> it massively improves the odds of finding criminals
That's a strong claim that requires equally strong evidence.
[1] https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/09/dna_matching_... ( http://archive.li/M0SeV )
That's awful wishful thinking. The general public is of the opinion that DNA evidence is 100% accurate and the government does a great job of continuing to present that farce. I wouldn't want to be the person who has to face a jury of their peers in the face of DNA evidence saying I committed a crime. Regardless of my alibi... I wouldn't trust the lay person to understand or get it right.
I'll bet X gets convicted.
His crime? Having an affair with a cop's wife. His DNA was found in the victim's body.
There is sworn testimony that the husband confessed to the murder of his own wife.
I'd hate to have been at the wrong place at the wrong time, or to have left garbage somewhere a crime was committed, or to have had sex with someone who later has a crime committed against them.
[1] https://www.bostonglobe.com/2019/11/15/opinion/texas-may-soo...
This is a really bad take, because we already know that China is running an ethnicity-based genocide and cultural obliteration programme in Xinjang.
You might also want to consider this case, which is the reverse: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/ray-cromar... - refusal to perform DNA testing even when the defense demands it.
In the case of the reverse: doesn't that just strengthen my point that this tool should be used to narrow the set of possible perpetrators?
Btw, I find the "this is a really bad take" verbiage to be rude and unnecessary. You could just leave it out and it wouldn't make your argument weaker.
That's why putting one's DNA on line is so dangerous and so bloody damn stupid!
For the life of me, I cannot understand why anyone would voluntarily put their DNA on any database when it's been so damn obvious for many years—from the very start—that police, governments, life insurance companies and crooks etc. are just dying to get their grubby little paws on this valuable information.
What annoys me even more is that people who put their DNA on these databases do so without consideration of those who are genetically related to them. When a person puts their DNA on a database, ipso facto, they are also violating the privacy of their near (and no-so-near) relatives, who in most instances, have never given their consent to do so.
Frankly, I consider this a terrible state of affairs and there should be strict laws against people doing it. Seems to me that now that the cat's out of the bag the only thing that can be done is to seed these databases with cleverly engineered noisy/disruptive profiles that would make tree analysis much harder to decipher.
As usual, few bother to think important stuff like this through before it becomes a done deal. It would be interesting to see a class-action lawsuit against DNA database holders by those who consider their privacy invaded.
If governments don't step in to control and regulate this unholy mess soon then I'd reckon it won't be long before the lawsuits begin. I'd put money on it.
I'm a little concerned about things like insurance, but as long as our country still has plenty of guns I'm not worried about Hitler 2.0. Your country might be different.
One would be for everyone to have a secure certificated [not able to be forged] anonymous hierarchical ID where those who have access to the ID/database are ranked/rated. For example on a rank of 10, the user would rate 10, your doctor 7 the government would rate say 5, your bank say 3. Such a ranking system would set the level of access and what data could be taken from the user's record.
There are many other solutions too which I've not go time to go into here.
Unfortunately, governments won't like such a schema because it puts citizens back in charge (and bureaucracies have never liked that)
How about, if you want socialized healthcare, you pay the cost of privacy. We guarantee to pay for your healthcare, but your DNA is freely available in everyone's database? Signing up for Medicare/Medicaid? Submit a DNA sample. That will give a huge population for study and the rest, people who aren't on socialized healthcare, can protect their DNA if they want. If the government is paying for your healthcare, you already lost your privacy to them anyways.
Obviously there is a big red flag about what gets classified as this criminal behavior, but if we can keep it to immediate acts of violence, then it may possibly be worthwhile.
Obviously if it remains guesswork then the reason to pursue this option doesn’t exist.
Who gets to define what counts as an "adverse effect"?
> if there are they are overridden by the benefits
Benefit to who? You? Society in general (by what definition of "society")? The doctor that defiantly isn't getting free lunches and other "gifts" from the company selling the treatment? The person receiving the treatment?
How are you judging the magnitude of the beneficial and harmful effects? Who gets to define what type of arguments are allowed to be considered when making that judgment?
Both real life and those dystopian movies have taught me that this is _never_ the case. There's literally a 0% chance of no adverse side effects.
Dna identification is pretty cool because the vast majority of cases where it's useful are cases where traces have been left at the scene of the crime or on a victim. That fact, the mere existence of a scene or a victim, constrains the use of the tool mostly to legitimate circumstances.
If my dna were used to lock up a relative who commits a rape or a murder I would be sad but I would consider it justified. I'm not going to do either of those things so I am not worried about whether the police would use dna to identify me. And considering the lack of scenarios where DNA could be misused, this is actually one of those situations where the innocent have nothing or next to nothing to worry about.