The consumer-genomics company 23andMe just sold its biobank of customer genetic data to drugmaker Regeneron for $256 million.

Regeneron is to pay $256 million in cash to acquire “substantially all” of 23andMe’s assets, including its massive biobank of around 15 million customer genetic samples and data.

  • AugustWestEnglish
    14•1 month ago

    By 2008 we were well into the “you should know better than give up personal data” era. That is no excuse. People are just stupid and don’t care.

    There were all sorts of publications telling people to protect their personal information, online and in the meat world by 2001, let alone 2008.

    I don’t want to victim blame, but going right into this with all the warnings seems pretty stupid to me.

    Now what does suck, and horribly so, is that there should be nothing of value gained from that data: there should be laws against nearly everything they could use for corporate advantage, exploitation, identity, etc. With severe consequences.

    That is the failure.

    • krolden
      5•1 month ago

      They used to tell us never tell anyone your name on the internet. This was in the 90s.