After analysis and thought and considering the 14th Amendment the ‘opt out’ option for law enforcement matching should be the default on Family Tree. It’s the only ethical thing to do. Opt In should be a deliberate choice made by those who have accounts on Family Tree.
As someone who administers my own Family Tree account and thirteen others this has become my position. Even those who are in Family Tree Projects are opted out. Why? Because the project managers are the custodians of those accounts and it’s their responsibility and the ethical thing to do to protect those accounts and their privacy. In the same sense Family Tree is the custodian of all the accounts. The ‘opt out’ option should be the default.
After receiving the new privacy email from Family Tree, I immediately wrote all the accounts I administer and advised them that I had opted out of law enforcement matching on their accounts and asked them to let me know if they wanted to opt in and I would change it. Only one person has responded. This response has helped me take the position that ‘opt ou’t should be the default.
The person who responded was rather irate because she didn’t even remember that she had tested for me three years prior. I had to gently remind her that she had tested three years ago for me and she sheepishly replied that she now remembered. She stated that she had no interest in her account.
Since I received no other responses from those I emailed this made me realize there are probably at least hundreds of accounts on Family Tree which are basically inactive and the same as those I administer. Some may be deceased or others completely lost interest and do not check their accounts and pay no attention to emails sent to them by Family Tree. Should they lose their 14th Amendment rights because of this? No!! It’s Family Trees responsibility to do the ethical thing and make ‘opt out’ the default.
A person with an active account on Family Tree should have to deliberately select to ‘opt in’ to Law Enforcement matching not the other way around.
As someone who administers my own Family Tree account and thirteen others this has become my position. Even those who are in Family Tree Projects are opted out. Why? Because the project managers are the custodians of those accounts and it’s their responsibility and the ethical thing to do to protect those accounts and their privacy. In the same sense Family Tree is the custodian of all the accounts. The ‘opt out’ option should be the default.
After receiving the new privacy email from Family Tree, I immediately wrote all the accounts I administer and advised them that I had opted out of law enforcement matching on their accounts and asked them to let me know if they wanted to opt in and I would change it. Only one person has responded. This response has helped me take the position that ‘opt ou’t should be the default.
The person who responded was rather irate because she didn’t even remember that she had tested for me three years prior. I had to gently remind her that she had tested three years ago for me and she sheepishly replied that she now remembered. She stated that she had no interest in her account.
Since I received no other responses from those I emailed this made me realize there are probably at least hundreds of accounts on Family Tree which are basically inactive and the same as those I administer. Some may be deceased or others completely lost interest and do not check their accounts and pay no attention to emails sent to them by Family Tree. Should they lose their 14th Amendment rights because of this? No!! It’s Family Trees responsibility to do the ethical thing and make ‘opt out’ the default.
A person with an active account on Family Tree should have to deliberately select to ‘opt in’ to Law Enforcement matching not the other way around.
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