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Biotech The Internet

DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Parent 198

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the anonymity-is-dead dept.
stuyman writes "NewScientist is reporting that anonymous sperm donation is not so anonymous anymore. An enterprising 15 year old tracked down his biological father, an anonymous sperm donor, using an online genealogy service and an online information service."
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DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Parent More

DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Parent

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  • A potentially ugly situation (Score:4, Interesting)

    by treff89 ( 874098 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @01:27AM (#13961386)
    This would be quite creepy if the (father) had never actually formally donated sperm. (ie. someone has picked up a condom or tissue, and impregnated themselves with the sperm.)
    • Except that sperm doesn't survive that long.
      • Sperm can survive days if the conditions are right. In a Condom it could easily last a few minutes which is all it'd take for some freak to find a discarded condom and put it in herself (making a hole in it of course).
      • Human sperm can "survive" for about 48 hours at body temp. -- where "survive" means they're still swimmers. Beyond that, they are viable (for lab impregnation) as long as they stay hydrated and uncontaminated (i.e. free of bacteria, mold, chemicals, etc.) [It's worth noting, your sperm is very likely contaminated by the time it gets out of you.] The actual genetic material will be (forensically) intact for years -- I'm not saying you could make a baby from it.

        As for "stealing" sperm... she'd have to get
    • According to TFA it was donor sperm - which implies that papa knew.

    • Re:A potentially ugly situation (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 06, 2005 @02:19AM (#13961535)
      You know what would be creepier? Having the following conversation with the doctor from the fertility clinic and then noticing that he has the same nose as you...

      Boy: Doctor, you told my mother that my father was an Astrophysics major at MIT and was born on July 16, 1968. But I tracked down the only man who fits that description and he's oriental which, as you can see, I am not.

      Doctor: Uh, er, yes, I see... That is a problem, isn't it? There must have been some sort of mixup. Uh, what was your name again?

      Boy: Luke.

      Doctor: Well I suppose I have something I should tell you. And actually you might find this rather funny if you are a Star Wars fan. You see Luke...

  • He didn't need DNA to narrow the search down (Score:5, Insightful)

    by old7 ( 564621 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @01:33AM (#13961406)
    Though his donor had been anonymous, his mother had been told the man's date and place of birth and his college degree. Using another online service, Omnitrace.com, he purchased the names of everyone that had been born in the same place on the same day. Only one man had the surname he was looking for, and within 10 days he had made contact.
    Knowing the place and date of birth of the father would narrow the search considerably. Even in a large city it could narrow the search to a few dozen. -Old7

  • At long last.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Altec at LM ( 591619 ) <erichgreen@cox.nCHICAGOet minus city> on Sunday November 06, 2005 @01:42AM (#13961432)
    ..an answer to the proverbial question, "Who's your daddy?"

  • Could lead to trouble (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Rethcir ( 680121 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @01:44AM (#13961439)
    18 years, 18 years,
    She got one of yo kids got you for 18 years

    I can just picture someone tracking down an anonymous sperm donor and trying to get child support out of them. Or is this subject covered in the contract you sign at the clinic?

    • Re:Could lead to trouble (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I believe there was a case in New York of a woman using her 'gift' from oral sex to impregnate herself without the man's consent - she then sued the man for child support and won.

      Only in America.
      • In these child support cases, the only thing concerning the judge is the interest of the child. Crime means nothing. So, the guy is doomed to lose in family court.

        He should try a civil suit for damages though. Punitive damages would be neat. Every month he pays her, and every month she pays him. If triple damages are awarded, he could make out pretty well.

        Just for revenge, criminal charges of fraud would be fun too. That's yet another court.
      • Reading from the link someone else provided:

        "She asserts that when plaintiff 'delivered' his sperm, it was a gift -- an absolute and irrevocable transfer of title to property from a donor to a donee," the decision said. "There was no agreement that the original deposit would be returned upon request."

        Who'da thunk that getting a blowjob involves a property transfer from one person to another. Sticky business, these things.
         
    • Good thing there are legal protections in place for fertility clinics. Actually stems from a lawsuit against a clinic in an attempt to collect child support. Stupid litigation based society.
    • Sorry, I don't have a link, but I recall reading about two female life partners who used a sperm donor to have a child. That relationship went sour, and the one that kept the child won child support from the donor in court. Talk about rough breaks.

    • Re:Could lead to trouble (Score:3, Informative)

      by Surt ( 22457 )
      Child support is the child's right to receive support from his/her parents. So unless the child is of legal age to sign away their rights to support (unlikely at birth), any such contract can't really legally protect you.

      A more likely contract, offered at at least a few places i've worked with, works more like insurance: if a claim for child support is made against you (the sperm donor) then the clinic will pay it off for you. The clinic then has contracts to further pass this risk on to their insurance c

  • I wonder (Score:5, Funny)

    by masterpenguin ( 878744 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @01:44AM (#13961441)
    I wonder now that Anonymous Sperm Donors can be tracked down, if Anonymous Cowards can also be tracked down?

  • Not Anymore (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Kawahee ( 901497 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @02:00AM (#13961484) Homepage Journal
    "NewScientist is reporting that anonymous sperm donation is not so anonymous anymore. An enterprising 15 year old..."

    What I'm noticing here is that these records have had to be held since around 1980... which suggests that it never really was that anonymous. I mean, back in 1990 you could still get DNA testing done (for a price).

  • Informational Awareness (Score:5, Insightful)

    by headkase ( 533448 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @02:10AM (#13961511)
    You know, and I'm only speaking for myself here, if my biological offspring were with it enough to do this by themselve(s) then I would actually love to hear from them and see where it went from there. Seriously, the best complement a child can pay to a parent is being exceptionally competent within the age they live in. This kid is definately an Information Age personality. Cool kid.

    • Re:Informational Awareness (Score:4, Insightful)

      by QuantumG ( 50515 ) <qg@biodome.org> on Sunday November 06, 2005 @02:33AM (#13961570) Homepage Journal
      Yep, and I'm sure you'd feel really proud considering that you've had nothing to do with their upbringing and just supplied less than half of their genetic material which was mostly random anyway. But hey, don't let that stop you from taking credit from the people who did the real work of actually raising the kid.
      • Someone mod the parent up?
        I agree and think that people put too much importance in biological links compared to what really matters: living together, educating the kids.
        Would it really matter if you're biological father/mother was someone else instead of your real (ie the one who have raised you) father/mother?

        It takes 30sec/9 month to make a children, it takes *20 years* to raise a children!
        • It takes 30sec/9 month to make a children, it takes *20 years* to raise a children!

          I understand where people like you are coming from, but raising a child can only channel the expression of what's preordained by the DNA. For example, to be a genius requires the genetic predisposition - you can't create it by raising the child, you only can nurture it. Which the GGP post was kind of referring to. Of course, raising is important as you can fail to realize the potential locked in the DNA, or worse, subvert

        • It takes 30sec [...] to make a children

          Dude, at least give her enough time to fake it.
        • Would it really matter if you're biological father/mother was someone else instead of your real (ie the one who have raised you) father/mother?

          Wouldn't you want to make sure you're not in love with your half-sister? In that sense, your biological parentage matters a great deal.

          Mal-2

      • It contacting me.... (Score:4, Interesting)

        by headkase ( 533448 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @04:04AM (#13961779)
        Another way to look at it is donors are helping someone who would otherwise not have their own child to love through a theraputic process that allows the reciever to conceive. Whether or not you agree with the ethical/legal concensus achieved so far is a different argument. Onwards, if the child feels a need to contact me in the first place because its a human and being human it may feel some qualitative feeling of comfort in meeting the next person up in it's lineage that goes back in an unbroken chain to algae give or take a billionish years ago. Your right, I would be a donor not a parent - but if the child wanted to see me I wouldn't be so callous as to not give it an audience.

      • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

        by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
        Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Re:Informational Awareness (Score:4, Insightful)

        by dasunt ( 249686 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @04:18AM (#13961818)
        Yep, and I'm sure you'd feel really proud considering that you've had nothing to do with their upbringing and just supplied less than half of their genetic material which was mostly random anyway.

        Less than half? Does 49% of your DNA come from your mother, 49% of your DNA come from your father, and the remaining 2% is from the aliens who abducted your parents?

        I'm scratching my head over this one. You better not bring up some bullshit about mitochondrian DNA, since there was nothing in the grandparent's post that excluded the poster from being female.

        • Genius, 99.9% of your DNA is functionally identical to my DNA. So it doesn't matter if it came from your mother or your father or your pet rock. Genetic variation is largely insignificant and what variation there is doesn't necessarily lead to phenome variation.
        • Men only contribute half of the nuclear dna. You've got a lot of dna OUTSIDE the nucleas that came from your mother.
              IANA Biologist/geneticist/other-related-field, but as I understand it the non-nuclear dna is pretty important as well.

          Mycroft
        • You better not bring up some bullshit about mitochondrian DNA, since there was nothing in the grandparent's post that excluded the poster from being female.

          Actually, it's unlikely that the grandparent post was referring to a female sperm donor being tracked down by her offspring.

      • I don't know about that. I was adopted, and there's very little that is good about myself and my talents that my 'parents' can take credit for. Less than a handful of things I am thankful for, and a larger fistful of bad issues. I had to do all the rest myself, relying on what came naturally to me. I have a daughter out there in the world, whose adoptive parents have done all the real work, but when I visit, there's something between us that is magical and cool. I haven't seen her many times in her life, I
    • You know, and I'm only speaking for myself here, if my biological offspring were with it enough to do this by themselve(s) then I would actually love to hear from them and see where it went from there.

      OK, that's fine for you, but if it were some other guy, that was having a rough time in his life because he was interrupted while hitting his crack pipe and generally kinda bummed that he cannot afford his AZT anymore to help with his AIDS that he got while prostituting himself to men on Hollywood blvd. That

  • Where to go? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Grendel Drago ( 41496 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @02:16AM (#13961526) Homepage
    Y'know, I've been considering donating sperm, 'cause I fit a profile (I'm tall, pale and went to plenty of school). Where does one sign up to donate? Err, sell, rather. Beer money and all.

    • Second. (Score:3, Funny)

      by Cyno01 ( 573917 )
      Whats the deal with this, im young, tall, white, middle class, no major health conditions in my family history, 160 something IQ, enroled in college... I bet i could make some decent $. Need to buy an engagement ring, but wouldnt that be weird telling her how i got the money...

  • Jakin' for beer money! OH YEAH! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 06, 2005 @02:23AM (#13961541)
    Donors were often college students who traded their sperm for beer money.

    A lot more apealing than giveing blood... Get paid to jack off? Just set up a nightly pick-up route in the freshman dormatories of any college!

  • I'd like to nominate this guy (Score:3, Funny)

    by accident ( 575230 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @03:34AM (#13961684)
    for hacker of the year. tres cool.
  • I submitted to AskSlashdot a piece on what I saw as the future ability of police to use this type of extrapolation to DNA finger people who aren't actually in a DNA database directly and the privacy rights implications. . The rejected submission is in my February journal entry: "DNA Incrimination by Extrapolation [slashdot.org]"
  • I took the submission title to be "DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Patent".

    A case of too much Slashdot reading, methinks.

    • I read it as "Birth Patent" the first time too. That gives me an idea for Slashdot's next April 1st edition... Headlines and article text that change everytime you click on them/do a mouseover/etc.

  • How many people like me glanced quickly at that headline and saw "DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Patent"?

    The scariest thing is if it really had said patent I wouldn't have found it that implausible.

  • Douglas Adams was a real prophet... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by fionbio ( 799217 ) on Sunday November 06, 2005 @04:51AM (#13961902)
    First something quite like original [wikipedia.org] Babel fish [slashdot.org], then these singing mice [slashdot.org], and now tracking down anonymous fathers. Well, what Arthur Dent donated was just his DNA, but similiarity is striking, isn't it?
  • I had to read the headline twice. The first time it didn't make much sense to me, as I read, "DNA and Online Search Finds Birth Planet" :P
    I thought, uhm why? I, for one, am fairly sure I was born here on earth.
  • .... Who's your daddy?
  • I can see it now. A bunch of towels that I made sperm donations to will sue me for support.

    This is bad. Real bad.

  • I've got 20 bucks we see this on a CSI episode within a year.

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