Re:Been doing it for awhile (Score 2, Informative)

As a professional using DNA for human identity every day, I can assure you that your fears are completely unfounded. UNLIKE a fingerprint (ink and thumb concept), a DNA 'fingerprint' is very incomplete. It is more like the biometric fingerprint. All a biometric reader sees is a handful of specific points to use as points of comparison. The DNA fingerprint works like that. It takes a handful of specific 'markers' that can help distinguish people. A DNA match in a crime or paternity or whatever is not a nucleotide base by base comparison. It is using specific differences to statistically support the match. It is entirely plausible for an innocent person to have a profile that matches another person. In fact, identical twins have identitical DNA. DNA evidence alone will never convict or acquit on its own. There has to be something else. For example, if the DNA match demonstrates a 1 in 3 million liklihood of it being the same person, one can imagine only one person in LA could have been the source of the DNA. That along with other physical and emperical evidence (witnesses saw the white bronco, OJ had motive, etc.), it becomes plausible that it is the same person. While I do worry that insurance companies can get information about diagnostic tests, there is no need to fear insurance companies getting a hold of DNA profiles from criminals. That data is essentially useless for disease information or anything else. Put your conspiracy theories back in your pocket and relax. Personally, I'd rather Big Brother had posession of my CODIS profile than my fingerprints which are much easier to plant or end up in innocent places- city streets, etc. If someone has a fingerprint card, they have all my fingerprint information. If somebody has my CODIS profile, they can't do anything useful.