Transcription
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Sil Savage, if I could just start with you. So, how many customers do you have approximately?
Um, between 14 and 15 million customers. Between 14 to 15 million.
I think you told Senator Britt just a minute ago that a goodly number of those are minors. Is that correct?
Um, what I said was I don't have the number of customers that you have the genetic data of of a good many minors. Is that correct? We have genetic data for a particular number of minors and I will be providing happy to provide people under the age of 18. Is that correct? That is how I'm defining a minor.
So they give your customers I just want to make sure I understand your business model. Your customers give you their genetic information for you to run various tests on. Is that right?
Yes, that is correct. And I mean that's pretty sensitive stuff, isn't it? Somebody's genetic information. Is there anything more personal than that?
Um, I would agree with you Senator that you know genetic data is sensitive information.
And so now you're just going to sell all of it? 15 million people, bunches of kids, maybe millions. It's just gonna be sold the open market as senator. You know the good news as I mentioned is that the two biders are buyers for the company. One is Regeneron which is the big pharma company big. It is a it doesn't make me feel any better. Is a large pharmaceutical company.
All right. So you're going to you're going to take 15 million Americans' genetic information and you're going to sell it to somebody. And your message to us is today trust us it'll be fine. Maybe it's a big pharma company. Maybe we'll get lucky. Maybe they'll treat it right.
I thought your privacy code, your privacy commitment said that consumers had a right not to have their information shared with anybody else without their consent. I mean, I've got your privacy statement right here. It says that without their consent, you can't share their information. You're about to sell it, Senator.
That consent is, you know, essentially for, you know, not real not share for research purposes and we are not sh selling it for research purposes.
Uh, so when you tell the consumer, give us your personal information and we'll take money from you and we won't give it to anybody without your consent, it's not real. It it just means, you know, maybe kind of depends on the day.
Um, Senator, you know, I will say that our customers' data is their own. They have the right at all times to access that information. They can edit it.
Well, sure they can, but but you're about to sell it to who knows who. They can't control it. You said to Senator Moody that consumers have complete control of their data. Complete. How can they have complete control if you're about to sell it without their consent?
Senator, they can delete that data anytime up until the sale and after.
Oh, okay. Okay. Delete. They can delete the data. Have you fixed the ability of customers to go on your website and delete it? Because right after you announced your sale, your deletion page went down. I hold in my hand here an article from the Wall Street Journal. 23andMe site goes down as customers struggle to delete their data. Can they even get onto your site to delete their data?
They can, Senator. And you fixed this. That was an issue that Yes, we fixed immediately after it's up and running now. Customers can go on. Customers can go on and they can delete their data.
What happens when they go onto your site to delete their data? When a customer logs into their account at 23andMe, they go to their settings page and they there's a section there where just click delete my data. It confirms that they want to delete their data and it's deleted automatically. Is that true?
Let's take a look. Let's take a look. Okay. When they go onto your page, they get an opportunity. It says permanently delete the data. So they click the button. It says permanently delete the data. And then they get a notification that says your account is no longer accessible. How do they know if they can't access their account anymore? How do they know their data has been deleted?
Because we send them a notification that their information has been deleted. You send it once. And how long does that take?
Um, you know, our policies state that, you know, we will delete their data within 30 days. And in most cases, we it is automatic and happens much quickly. And when you delete it, it it's deleted. Deleted. It's gone forever. All the genetic data is deleted forever.
And yes, really because that's not what your privacy statement says in the fine print. Let's read it. What your statement says is we retain personal information for as long as necessary to provide the services and fill the transactions you've requested to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, enforce agreements, etc., etc. And then it goes on 23andMe and or our contracted genotyping laboratory will retain your genetic information even if you choose to delete your account.
Senator, you know 23andMe it does not retain any genetic information regarding the consumer once they delete their account. We do it says right here that you will retain Weet, date of birth and sex even if you choose to delete your account. This is your privacy policy. I'm I'm I'm just quoting from it.
Um, Senator, you know, to the best of my knowledge, we do not maintain any genetic information. It says, "Even if you choose to delete your account, we will retain Weet, date of birth and sex. Even if you choose to delete your account, there is some information that we do retain such as but not related to the genetic information right but that you know such as name, email address and other ah so even if ah even if you delete the account you retain their name you retain their email address you retain their date of birth you retain their sex and you retain their genetic information even if they choose to delete your account.
So, in other words, don't don't talk to your suit behind you. Talk to me. He's not testifying. You are. You do not allow consumers actually to delete permanently their data. And when you said a minute ago to Senator Moody, at all times consumers have complete control of their data. That's just not true, is it? By the terms of your own agreement, that just is not true.
Senator, with all due respect, all of the genetic data is deleted. We are only making with all due respect, what you are telling me is in direct contravention to what your own policy states. Even if you choose to delete your account, in fact, what you do is you allow your consumers to delete their account settings, but their data isn't deleted. You still have it. The laboratory still has it. You have their name. You have their date of birth. You have their sex. And now you're going to sell it.
Here's my point. It's a pattern. Your consumers actually aren't in control of anything. You are. You control their data. You control their genetic information. Now you're about to sell it. You promise them we won't ever sell it without your consent. But you're doing it. You promise them we'll allow you to delete it. But you don't. In fact, you've lied to them. Have you not, Senator?
We have not. We I assure you that we are deleting all of our customers who have requested.
No, you're not. You're not because your policies say they're not. and you're not deleting it because if you were, your company wouldn't be worth $300 million.
No, don't read from don't read from what your guy behind you is is shoveling talking points to you now. I don't want your talking points. I've read your policies. I've seen what they are. And I I tell you what, it's amazing to me you're not getting your socks sued off by your customers. I hope they will. I hope they will rush to the courthouse, even as we are here today, to sue you into oblivion for lying to them and taking their most personal identifiable information and selling it for a profit and lying to them and to the American public.
Quite frankly, Mr. Salavage, what you're doing here has all kinds of implications, national security implications, all of it. But nothing is worse than taking the personal identifiable information of American consumers and keeping it and lying to them about it while you make a huge profit off of it. It's unbelievable to me. It's absolutely unbelievable.
This concludes our hearing. I want to thank each of the witnesses for taking the time to share your experience, your expertise, and your perspectives. Written questions can be submitted for the record until Wednesday, June 18th at 5 p.m. I'll ask the witnesses to answer and return questions to the committee within two weeks. The hearing is adjourned.