This article was about how the discovery, on September tenth of nineteen eighty-four in Britain by a British scientist Alec Jeffreys, found out that members of a family have different DNA but also have some similarities between the parents and the child. Each person's DNA is unique but there are still similarities between family members in certain area, except identical twins whom are sharing the same DNA. DNA does not tell race but it show information that is very useful to the police if they are finding a certain person. This discovery was found with the help of the information within the police's files, the Britain's DNA databases.
The British policemen or women collected DNA sample from any criminal they captured and collected it into the database no matter if they were guilty or not. The FBI of the United States has the world largest DNA databases and it was set up in 1995 and holds about eight percent of the United States' population which would be about around twenty-four millions people. The data was use to either catch a criminal or to find relatives. The DNA has helped "solved seventeen thousands crimes in Britain including eighty-three killings and a hundred and eighty four rapes" (Lawless ppo. 1 par. 7). Yet, even though FBI has plenty of DNA data they are still expanding the databases by collecting more and more DNA from criminals they had caught and innocent people whom they thought were criminals. The information that was six point seven million profiles will now be expected to grow more to about one point two million or more by two thousand and twelve. This mean there will be more and more invasion into other people's privacy. People in the twenty first centuries are trying to protect their private information and identities. Yet, people, who are arrested no matter if they have committed a crime or not, DNAs are being collected by the FBI without their permission.
In Britain, even children at the age of ten also have their DNA recorded into the databases. This is invading into the personal information of other people but it also helped the police find the true criminals to the crime and found lost family members. To some people this was a way to invading the privacy of other and it is wrong, but within the scientist and some other people this was a brilliant discovery to help policemen and women find the criminal and lost family members. Jeffreys fears that police will use the information to brand innocent people or future criminals. "Jeffreys, 59, said about 800,000 innocent people are on the database, raising fears of 'discrimination, breach of genetic privacy, stigmatization - there's a whole host of issues here"' (Lawless ppo. 1 par. 5).
Women who were rap found the criminal by the DNA left behind by the culprit. Killing crimes solved by the DNA found at the crime scene. Family members lost but found thanks to the DNA information from the family members. That is the good side but the bad side of collecting DNA samples is also like collecting the person's identity and personal information, like who are their family members and other personal information usually doctor will know after a check-up. The main lesson was that collecting data can help so much like solving crime and finding lost members but it is also our personal information that is being collected for research or files that can be looked up anytime.
total: 580 words
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