SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Catalonia's regional government will collect DNA samples in order to identify people who died in during Spain's 1936-1939 civil war and the subsequent dictatorship of Francisco Franco:
Spain's Catalonia region has launched the country's first public DNA profiling project in a bid to identify some of the 114,000 people who disappeared during the nation's civil war and subsequent dictatorship. The issue is hugely sensitive in Spain, where rights abuses during the 1936-1939 conflict and the ensuing 36-year rule of dictator Francisco Franco remain uninvestigated for fear of reviving divisions.
Raul Romeva, who handles transparency matters in Catalonia's regional government, described the initiative as "a decisive step towards restoring" historical memory. "It is a democratic duty that was long pending," he told AFP news agency on Wednesday. "This should have started 40 years ago," added Romeva, referring to Franco's death in 1975 and the subsequent transition to democracy.
Under the programme, scientists will create a database for the DNA profiles of those related to people who disappeared. For this, they will collect samples from remains found in mass graves, and try and find matches with the help of the Barcelona-based Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences. A similar project has already been set up in Barcelona on a smaller-scale, but it is privately-funded by two descendants of people who disappeared. In the space of five years, they have collected 125 genetic samples from relatives, but have not been able to cross-check the data with any remains as they do not have access to mass graves.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Thursday September 08 2016, @07:15PM
I can think of a lot of good things that could come out of such a public DNA database, like ways for epidemiologists to better fight pandemics, anthropologists to map human migrations, and that sort of thing. This project sounds like another good use.
It is the many nefarious uses that give me pause. Now that easy gene editing has arrived via CRISPR/Cas9 on the one hand, and the proof that the government has thoroughly abrogated the Constitution via the NSA (among many other crimes), giving up my DNA to the government is the last thing I'd trust them with.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 08 2016, @08:35PM
Now that easy gene editing has arrived via CRISPR/Cas9 on the one hand, and the proof that the government has thoroughly abrogated the Constitution via the NSA (among many other crimes), giving up my DNA to the government is the last thing I'd trust them with.
Seems like CRISPR is the solution. After you give a DNA sample, just re-engineer your own DNA so you are no longer a match.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 08 2016, @11:12PM
It is the many nefarious uses that give me pause. Now that easy gene editing has arrived via CRISPR/Cas9 on the one hand, and the proof that the government has thoroughly abrogated the Constitution via the NSA (among many other crimes), giving up my DNA to the government is the last thing I'd trust them with.
Absolutely! I'm going to call the U.S. senators from Catalonia and let them know that they're barking up the wrong tree and that the U.S. constitution applies to them, too!
We can't allow this sort of extreme government overreach in our country! The government of Catalonia needs to respect the constitution!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 08 2016, @11:15PM
Cute, but he was clearly speaking generally and didn't mean that Catalonia was part of the US. Governments collecting DNA on a massive scale is unethical no matter what country it happens in.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 08 2016, @11:24PM
I see your sarcasm detector isn't in good working order.
You might want to get that checked out [youtube.com].
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 08 2016, @11:30PM
Cute, but he was clearly speaking generally and didn't mean that Catalonia was part of the US. Governments collecting DNA on a massive scale is unethical no matter what country it happens in.
Same AC here. What's more, despite the NSA and other TLAs illegal activities, the only folks in the U.S. creating huge databases of its citizenry are private corporations (leaving aside CODIS [wikipedia.org], which is a different animal and has its own set of ethical/legal issues).
Even worse, you ended that sentence with a preposition. For shame!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 09 2016, @12:06AM
What's more, despite the NSA and other TLAs illegal activities, the only folks in the U.S. creating huge databases of its citizenry are private corporations (leaving aside CODIS, which is a different animal and has its own set of ethical/legal issues).
For now. Although, law enforcement in some states often collects DNA unnecessarily when you're arrested, even if you are later releases. The government can also get the data from private corporations.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 09 2016, @02:51AM
What's more, despite the NSA and other TLAs illegal activities, the only folks in the U.S. creating huge databases of its citizenry are private corporations (leaving aside CODIS, which is a different animal and has its own set of ethical/legal issues).
"But corporations do it too", ignores both the greater abuses possible to government agencies and that the worst abuse of huge private databases is by a government agency getting access. There is a theme here.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 09 2016, @12:08PM
What's more, despite the NSA and other TLAs illegal activities, the only folks in the U.S. creating huge databases of its citizenry are private corporations (leaving aside CODIS, which is a different animal and has its own set of ethical/legal issues).
"But corporations do it too", ignores both the greater abuses possible to government agencies and that the worst abuse of huge private databases is by a government agency getting access. There is a theme here.
Same AC here. I wasn't giving the government or corporations a pass on this. I was pointing out that despite the paranoia expressed by the previous posters, the scumbags at the various government agencies aren't (yet) compiling vast DNA databases the same way as they are with phone metadata and internet traffic.
Currently, the corporations that are amassing these DNA databases are doing so with the cooperation of the folks giving them their genetic material for "testing." I imagine that, in large part, those are the same folks who give Google, Facebook and other marketing leeches their PII and allow them to track their entire lives, online and offline.
That doesn't mean the government won't start tapping those DNA databases "for the children!" and/or have HHS set guidelines "suggesting" that hospitals and birthing centers take DNA from every child born in their facilities at some point in the future.
But that's not going on at the moment, and I imagine that, given the uproar over SOPA, CISPA and its ilk, we'd see widespread opposition to this sort of thing, at least in the US.
As the old saw goes, "just because you're paranoid, it doesn't meant they aren't out to get you."
For the moment, DNA databases are much less of a worry than Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act [eff.org], Sectionj 215 of the PATRIOT Act [eff.org], the use of IMSI catchers like Stingrays [wikipedia.org] by all manner of "law enforcement" groups, the continuing militarization of police [wikipedia.org], increasing consolidation and cartelization of the Internet Broadband/Content industries [nytimes.com] and a host of other, more pressing (as they're actually happening) issues.
Perhaps we should address those issues, rather than railing about stuff that isn't actually going on? Just a crazy thought.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 08 2016, @11:51PM
I'd be very concerned if they collected my DNA and my family's whatever good faith reason the governement gives. Specially worrying if that governement is an ultranationalist one that have been disobeying the laws and the Constitution while openly saying that will declare the independence of the region in the next few months.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 10 2016, @01:25PM
Nice big DNA databases make it easier for a future and less encompassing group to selectively cull members of its society who do not meet the genetic profile deemed acceptable, as well as all their relatives, friends, associates and anyone else who they might feel the urge to purge.
For people who thought the SS, STASI, or any of the dozens to hundreds of groups who have been doing deliberate and bureaucratically efficient ethnic cleansing since were as bad as it gets, imagine when you can take DNA from any person caught up in a sweep, checkpoint, etc and compare them to your list of 'ethnically banned humans' for immediate purging. Forget political dissidents, imagine when your very genetics qualify you as a enemy of the republic (or whatever your government is.) We are fast approaching a time where I can see all of the genetic diversity we have left being purge in what could largely qualify as 'one fell swoop.' I can only hope if it does happen that it is not long after followed by a massive epidemic upon the remaining humans who without the genetic diversity can't find a cure and die out to make way for a future species elevation to a modern level of 'civilization', hopefully without the same caliber of mistakes we seem inevitably on the path to make.