GINA prohibits employers/insurers from discriminating against you based on your genetic info
That's an incredibly weak response. Someone asks you about the privacy you provide and you say it's illegal for other people to misuse the information. That's like me asking a company what they're going to do with and how they're going to protect my social security number and the company rep pausing and saying "Um, yeah . . . don't worry, identity fraud is illegal." Not the most confidence inspiring thing I've ever heard.
I spent several years in the privacy sector and take it from me that protecting this kind of information is hard enough when the organization actually has a commitment to meeting industry standard privacy best practices and laws, let alone at a company that apparently ignores them. (Please correct me if your company actually does comply with HIPAA or any other federal privacy laws -- I'm just going by you responding to a question about your privacy compliance by rattling off a reference to some newly-passed law that is non-binding on your company.)
Relying on GINA here is completely irresponsible. If you're serious about handling sensitive health information, you ought to comply with HIPAA and have that compliance routinely audited. Period.
Otherwise no one should trust your company or, in my opinion, take it seriously at all.
- as we add more people to our database (including Asians), we can make new discoveries relevant to particular genetic groups
- GINA prohibits employers/insurers from discriminating against you based on your genetic info
- we will not patent genes. we want to empower people by giving them the ability to access and interact with their genetic information