Are we ALL able to properly assess the value of the information on our DNA?
In the last few days I wanted to do a small test, without scientific value, to understand what value we give to the information inside our DNA, considering 2 different targets: one informed on these issues, one probably much less informed.
To do this I asked a provocative question: “For how much money would you sell your DNA information?” to these 2 targets:
a) the Facebook group of Impactscool, our non-profit organization that deals with the future, emerging technologies and futures critical thinking ;
b) some Instagram pages of our network (in particular @cambiamentoclimatico and @curious_it) in addition to my personal IG page (@andreadusi).
On Facebook (here the link) out of 4500+ people registered in the group, 100 people responded at the moment, with these results:
- about 45% would never sell their DNA data;
- 26% would give it free of charge for the “sake of science”;
- 8% would sell them for a 1,000,000 euro or an annuity;
- 6% would sell them for € 100,000;
- 4% for 10,000 euros or less.
There were also a dozen comments with questions asking to better specify who the buyer would possibly be, in order to better decide eventually the answer to be given.
So for a group that is on average pretty well educated on technologies and the future, the value given to the information inside personal DNA is very high.
On Instagram the question was asked in the stories in a different way:
On the first page I had 899 answers, on the second page 90, on the third 562, for a total of 1551 answers (I attached the screenshots at the end of the article).
The most representative age groups in all three pages were 18–24 and 25–34, essentially 50% man/women.
Interestingly, in this case the average response was an average of 10,000 euros, but with a fairly equivalent number between people who would give DNA for free and people who would never sell their DNA (the symbol of infinity).
The take away I have from this small test is the following: if you are informed about the value of the data contained in your DNA, you give it a very high value.
Alternatively, if you are not aware of it, you are not able to give it the right value.
Obviously, the observation above seems trivial but perhaps it is not so much.
In fact in a world where DNA data will represent the next frontier of our privacy, we must act to create awareness to avoid that maybe a political dictatorship (China) or a commercial one (the big US tech companies) will succeed to take advantage out of this lack of education to create immense databases of such personal information for purposes not aimed at the happiness of the individual.
Following the screenshot from the IG pages
