?SCAM COVID19 genetic risk test offer from Michael Francis Madarasz at sequencing.com

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I've heard other people say that they labeled the package as "genealogy material" or "genealogy sample" for international shipping purposes. They did not have any problems getting kits back to the United States in the regular mail this way. I would NOT inform the post office that...

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It means that everyone sharing her haplogroup and Demasduit share a common ancestor. It doesn't mean that she's a direct descendant of Demasduit. She's probably what you'd consider an "extremely distant cousin". I'm in group K. Our "mascot" is Ötzi the Iceman. Ötzi is a natural ...

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I did the transfer in the other direction (FTDNA -> MH) and my results are somewhat different. MH was using the same test chip as FTDNA when I did the transfer a few years ago. Here are my most recent estimates at each company as an example:

FTDNA: 50% Scandinavian, 42% England Wales...

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The email did not have my name on it. For what it is worth, I reported the "phisherman" to the Gmail security team. I bet he got my email address from GEDmatch. It would be easy to grab thousands of genealogy enthusiast email addresses there. I've been thinking about deleting my account since...

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"FTDNA" was on the email subject line. That is why I was curious to know if other FTDNA members had received a similar message or if anyone had heard of the company. I have never received "genealogy spam" at this email address. I was not thinking about pursuing it....

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I got an email offer a few hours ago for a "free COVID-19 genetic risk analysis" at the email I have on file at FTDNA and GEDmatch from this person: "Michael Francis Madarasz" [email protected] at "sequencing.com" . The email looks unprofessional and I am concerned...

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I'm using Brother's Keeper now. It is very reasonably priced ($40 US) shareware that you can try for free before you pay and register to have access to all of the features. It handles many different languages and alphabets and has been around for quite a few years. A friend in Norway recommended it...

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Peter--You can get this type of information at MyHeritage, which accepts transfers. MH will tell you how many of your matches have a specific region in their estimate. MH also gives you a list of where your matches currently live, which is potentially more useful in my opinion. For example, I have more...

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How does your autosomal DNA compare? You have a good chance of matching a 4th cousin, around 50% or so. Scott is such a common name. . .

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Douglas, that 1749 cM niece sounds like full niece, not a half niece. How wonderful you were able to meet her! ...

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Everyone with group K mitochondrial DNA shares a common maternal ancestor with Ötzi. I think of him as our group K mascot! I read that he was lactose intolerant.

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I got trace Siberian as well. It might be irrelevant background noise, as I am 100% northern European as far as I know. If it is real, it might be related to my Scandinavian (majority) or Finnish (small amount) ancestry. Some of my immigrant ancestors came from the far northern parts of Scandinavia...

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Re: Swedish DNA
In my experience, FTDNA is particularly good for finding DNA matches with Swedish ancestry! I have vast numbers of Swedish matches on FTDNA's Family Finder, and almost all of my zero distance full sequence mitochondrial DNA matches are Swedish. I attended a series of lectures on...

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Doug--Thanks for sharing your inspiring story! Do you think the few leads that were generated by the professional genealogists were essential to your big breakthrough? Would you have reached the same conclusion eventually with information from your new DNA matches? How nice that others were willing...

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Donnset--you have a really great lead! I hope that your new 2nd cousin is helpful. You may want to upload your DNA results from FTDNA to GEDmatch and MyHeritage and search for other close matches on those sites. Ancestry has the largest database, so it might be worthwhile to purchase one of their tests...