11 comments

  • voidUpdate 47 minutes ago
    IF there was a secure and trustable way that a trusted government could retain DNA information, then I feel like people having a DNA test at birth or on becoming a citizen could be useful, both medically ("your sample indicates you may have a higher risk of dementia") and from a policing standpoint ("we found DNA on this woman's clothes and immediately matched it to this man who hasn't committed a crime before" or "we were able to identify this john doe because their DNA was on record"). However, given that companies and governments are awful, I don't think it could ever actually work in practice :/
    • alistairSH 4 minutes ago
      How close does a DNA "match" have to be to get somebody tossed in jail? Do they actually require 100%, or is a "match" something less? What's the false-positive rate? Would a non-twin sibling's DNA "match"?

      Yes, I'm aware that, in theory, DNA is unique. As is the theory for finger-prints. But, I'm also aware that theory is rarely reality.

    • mft_ 42 minutes ago
      Indeed. It’s essentially the age-old conundrum: I don’t need to worry about my privacy because I’m not breaking the rules… until someone changes the rules.
    • inigyou 18 minutes ago
      Perfect enforcement of crimes is a bad thing. If criminal law was perfectly enforced we'd still be in Prohibition and PGP would also be illegal.
      • voidUpdate 16 minutes ago
        It's generally quite hard to get a DNA sample from someone's PGP signature
    • usrnm 42 minutes ago
      Life in general would be a lot simpler and nicer in a perfect world with perfect (whatever it means) people in it
    • sidewndr46 39 minutes ago
      There are several European countries that do this from what I understand
      • hvb2 34 minutes ago
        Do what, fingerprinting or collecting DNA? Not sure what you're trying to say, if Europe does it, it's fine?

        The gist is that this was always done when people were arrested for criminal offences. They're now doing it for civil offences and, like with all the ICE stuff, it seems to be do first, ask questions later. So you can be a citizen but your data might end up in their systems anyway as it's submitted before they find out you are a citizen...

        • spwa4 2 minutes ago
          A few things we can know for sure. The Dutch immigration enforcement authority, IND, has a blanket exception for to the GPDR collecting any kind of information on anybody "for the purposes of immigration enforcement".

          10 years ago we found out, from a budget proposal that was in dispute, that the police had sent every mental health database in the Netherlands to Palantir. Regular health databases too, but if you're Dutch, Peter Thiel knows exactly what you told the "the law guarantees you can trust me" social worker. Everything.

      • voidUpdate 29 minutes ago
        Slightly biased because I'm a european, but I think a european country is more likely to be trust-able with a country-wide DNA database. Only slightly more though, I still wouldn't trust them to actually do it right
      • ljf 19 minutes ago
        Interested in this as I haven't heard of this from an all population point of view, do you know which European countries this is? I know many have a national DNA database but that is limited to those charged with crimes (or suspected of in some cases, in some countries these are removed later).
  • b3ing 28 minutes ago
    Maybe they can use it later to match the ICE rapists with the women and kids that are being sexually assaulted, something no one wants to talk about
  • kardianos 31 minutes ago
    They don't mention this, but one major reason for this is to validate claims of family units and prevent trafficking.

    This is, I suspect, a good thing. The article never states any downsides, other then nebulous claims. Yes, DNA is like finger printing someone, which is routinely done for arrests, but has the benefit of assisting in claims of family relations, which is at the heart of many ICE concerns.

    • jackmott42 22 minutes ago
      Look at this guy making excuses for the Nazis
  • lorreyfum 5 minutes ago
    Good. Make it easier to track and identify them when they break more laws.
    • alistairSH 3 minutes ago
      When who breaks more laws?
  • ck2 11 minutes ago
    we're officially in the "just try to stop us" phase of authoritarianism

    next up, armed ICE around voting locations despite federal law

    because "just try to stop us"

    then refusal to seat voted delegates

    because "just try to stop us"

    the idea is to normalize the obscenity of it all, like the billions in wildly illegal grifting

    king's image on buildings, airports, passports, park passes, coins and $250 bill

    whitehouse demolished, fights on front lawn, statues covered in gold while people can't get healthcare or even food

    people arrested and prosecuted at great expense then quietly dismissed

    all normalized somehow without mass outrage

    • functionmouse 9 minutes ago
      I mean, are YOU going to try to stop them?
      • alistairSH 0 minutes ago
        Like Susan Collins, I shall furrow my brow to indicate my unease with the situation.

        Kidding, sort of, if brownshirts and other government-sanctioned thugs show up in November, I'm really not sure what I'll do. They're already making noise about doing extra "Watching" of elections in my area (Fairfax County) and as far as I can tell, the only criteria for that is "they vote blue, so it must be fraud!"

  • effnorwood 18 minutes ago
    [dead]
  • CurbStomper 42 minutes ago
    [dead]
  • throwaway2027 1 hour ago
    Just in time to train an AI model on it and discriminate based on heuristics. /s
    • zombot 33 minutes ago
      Maybe they'll discover the illegal-immigrant gene or the unwanted-wrongthinker gene.
  • sieabahlpark 1 hour ago
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