Your privacy is our priority
Your data is yours, and yours alone.
No user other than you can access your data.
Questions? Contact us 24/7 at 1-800-MYHERITAGE
What data do we collect?
To facilitate the processing of your Ethnicity Estimate and DNA Matches, MyHeritage collects the following data: your cheek swab DNA sample, your name, mailing address, email address, and year of birth.
In addition to the data mentioned above, customers who purchase a MyHeritage DNA Health+Ancestry kit are required to answer a questionnaire about their personal and family health history in order to proceed with genetic testing.
The purpose of this questionnaire is to determine the relevance of our full range of Genetic Risk and Carrier Status Reports to you, as well as to gain a holistic understanding of any hereditary conditions in your family history.
Who can access your data?
All of your DNA and health data is stored on secure servers and is protected by multiple layers of encryption. Your identifying information is stored separately from your DNA data, Health Questionnaire, and your results. Your privacy is of utmost importance to us — even we can’t access your health reports unless you explicitly request that we do.
Physician oversight is provided only in the United States, by an independent physician network, PWNHealth, which supervises genetic testing for the health portion of this service, and provides genetic counseling.
The information you provide, including your Health Questionnaire, will be evaluated by a clinical team from PWNHealth, including a physician who will determine your eligibility to receive the full range of reports offered with our health service.
After your results are generated, your reports will be reviewed by the PWNHealth clinical team, who will determine whether genetic counseling is advised. If genetic counseling is recommended, results will only be available online once the counseling session is scheduled. This is included in the price of your purchase, at no added cost.
How can you control your data?
You control all of your personal information.
This includes enabling or disabling DNA Matching on MyHeritage, allowing or preventing your DNA Matches to view your Ethnicity Estimate, allowing or preventing DNA Matches to view shared DNA segments, and more.
You may disable health reports for incurable conditions such as Late-Onset Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases if you prefer not to know the results. You may view these reports at any time by changing your privacy settings.
You are the sole owner of your DNA data and health reports.
- We are the only DNA company that pledges to never share your data with insurance companies.
- We will never share your data with any third parties without your explicit consent.
- You are the owner of your data and you can delete it permanently at any time.
- Your reports will be shared with PWNHealth to facilitate physician oversight of your test.
While you can delete your MyHeritage account and DNA data from our servers at any time, PWNHealth will keep your Health Questionnaire, a summarized PDF file of your health reports, and any other health information you have provided to PWNHealth for a period of up to 10 years, in compliance with applicable regulations.