23andMe, the company whose mail-in self-testing kits became synonymous with DNA testing, is filing for bankruptcy amid slowing sales four years after it went public. Anne Wojcicki, who co-founded 23andMe in 2006, is stepping down as CEO as the company tries to find a buyer.
In January, 23andMe said it was exploring options for a sale amid slowing demand for its product and the fallout of a major data breach in 2023. In 2024, the company agreed to a financial settlement for the breach, which affected 6.9 million users. The company had also announced layoffs of about 40% of its workforce in late 2024. Recently, the company’s stock dipped below a dollar, putting it in danger of being delisted from the NASDAQ.
In a note to customers, the company said nothing is currently changing about the way it stores, manages or protects customer data and that the company is still open for business and selling DNA kits. “Through this process, we will seek to find a partner who shares our commitment to customer data privacy and allows our mission of helping people access, understand and benefit from the human genome to live on,” the company said in its post.
At its peak, 23andMe became the best-known name in the emerging area of DNA self-testing, with users paying $99 for kits that gave them insights into their genetic makeup, potential relatives and ancestry. But the company’s momentum slowed down in recent years after its $3.5 billion public offering in 2021.
People who have used 23andMe and are concerned about what might happen to their data in a sale have options: They can download their information then delete their account, as well as ask the company to discard their DNA material in addition to deleting the data. Doing so will keep DNA information from being used in future research, but it can’t be removed from research that has already been done.
‘Get your data out of there’
Arthur Caplan, head of the division of medical ethics at NYU’s Grossman School of Medicine, has been critical of 23andMe for decades. He said he was not surprised by the announcement, having just predicted it in January.
“They were more interested in getting data, saliva, to resell,” Caplan told CNET. “It was marketed and received as a cute hobbyist sort of thing. But that wasn’t really the goal that gave it the billions of dollars of value it once had.”
Caplan said the company’s business model promised ancestry information that he believes was not reliable to begin with.
“I don’t think the science was very good,” he said, adding with a sale of the company, there’s no legal obligation to ensure customer privacy under another owner.
The risks, Caplan said, is that the data could be used in ways people who’ve handed over their saliva can’t anticipate.
“DNA information is very sensitive — it can tell you things about paternity, it can lead government agencies to come after you that you didn’t think about,” he said. “The genetic data could be used to advertise or market to you. A third party could decide you’re not eligible for insurance.
“My advice is get your data out of there. I would not leave it there and it might be too late,” Caplan said.
Source: CNET
