By now, almost everyone has learned about the data breach and resulting bankruptcy at 23andMe, the DNA search company.
By all accounts, this breach has destroyed the privacy and confidentiality of more individuals and in-depth records of any to date. Depending on which source you believe, it’s somewhere in excess of half the population of the country, with losses of unrecoverable medical and related records.
Was this predictable or preventable? Probably, but perhaps it was inevitable. Many questions arise.
Who could be held accountable and have the capacity to make things right? It’s up to the law enforcement organizations to determine whether there are criminal prosecutions, but as for civil and private damages, it doesn’t look like there’s going to be anybody home to meet claims for monetary damages.
Swell — the folks who allowed this to happen will hide behind the “cleansing fire of bankruptcy,” and the damaged individuals and families will be on their own.
Now we wonder: What’s the worst that could happen?
We at Molière Citations have been so overwhelmed by the horrific implications of the One-Two punch of the 23andMe data breach and bankruptcy that we had to augment our online search for news and analysis with an AI search to grasp the vast implications of this turn of events.
We asked about the various implications of the breach-cum-bankruptcy, and got quite a robust response:
” 🚨WORST-CASE OUTCOMES
1. Sale of Sensitive Data to Hostile Entities
- Scenario: In bankruptcy, 23andMe’s assets (including genetic data) could be auctioned or sold.
- Risk: A hostile nation-state or malicious actor could legally (or covertly) acquire vast troves of personal health and genetic data.
- Implications:
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- Doxxing or blackmail of individuals based on genetic markers.
- Profiling of populations for surveillance or discrimination.
- Use in intelligence operations (e.g., identifying genetic vulnerabilities of high-profile individuals).
2. Genetic-Based Bioweapons or Targeted Pathogens
- Scenario: A hostile actor uses data to engineer pathogens that target specific ethnic or genetic groups.
- Feasibility: Not currently easy—but not science fiction anymore. Synthetic biology and CRISPR technologies are evolving rapidly.
- Implications:
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- A pathogen designed to interact with certain alleles (e.g., genes prevalent in specific populations).
- Genocide or bioterrorism that’s hard to detect or attribute.
3. Widespread Discrimination & Insurance Risk
- Scenario: Genetic information is used to discriminate in employment, insurance, or access to healthcare.
- Implications:
- Violation of privacy and civil liberties.
- Increased risk for people with certain genetic predispositions.
4. Loss of Trust in Biotech and Precision Medicine
- Public trust in genomic research and personalized medicine could collapse.
- This could hinder legitimate progress in healthcare, disease prevention, and rare disease treatments.
If this prospect doesn’t make the pending “Constitutional crisis” pale in comparison, you must be smoking something stronger than tobacco. (Or maybe there’s some federal judge who will order the safe return of all the personal health information that was compromised in this debacle.)
No doubt we will come back to this terrible situation with more Citations, as more of those involved come to light.
We can even hope that some heroes may appear to help with damage control and effective counter-measures.
But for now, we’ll issue the Molière Citation to the managers and techies from the 23andMe “organization,” and hope for the best.
We are pleased to include this public service announcement in the form of a link to online instructions for our readers who may be affected and need to delete their information from the files of 23andMe.
Photo: New Africa/Freepik