>But really, how stable is that policy in the face of changing corporate owners, changing political administration (romney?), changing supreme court justices, changing geopolitics?
That's a valid point, but a few things reassure me. Firstly that confidentiality cert from DHHS probably isn't going to be made useless by a political entity any time soon (and I'd assume, though would need to research, that such a cert would also apply to any buyers should 23AM get picked up by someone else, and probably carries some requirements for them as well)
Even then, I doubt within the next 60 or so years left on my lifespan that there will be any shenanigans in that area... and after I'm gone, they can do whatever the hell they want with my sequence :)
I'd imagine that, given enough time and cost reduction, services like this will become nationalized, where your genome is sequenced at birth for identity and health purposes.
That's a valid point, but a few things reassure me. Firstly that confidentiality cert from DHHS probably isn't going to be made useless by a political entity any time soon (and I'd assume, though would need to research, that such a cert would also apply to any buyers should 23AM get picked up by someone else, and probably carries some requirements for them as well)
Even then, I doubt within the next 60 or so years left on my lifespan that there will be any shenanigans in that area... and after I'm gone, they can do whatever the hell they want with my sequence :)
I'd imagine that, given enough time and cost reduction, services like this will become nationalized, where your genome is sequenced at birth for identity and health purposes.