23andMe has changed hands, changed names and is now in court. In 2023, hackers accessed data linked to almost 7 million customers. In March 2025 the company filed for bankruptcy, and in July 2025 it was sold for $305 million to TTAM Research Institute, a nonprofit created by its co-founder Anne Wojcicki, which then renamed itself 23andMe Research Institute. In May 2026, California's attorney general sued the company's former parent over the 2023 breach, alleging that its security was so lax that the attackers went undetected for more than five months. If you tested years ago and have not logged in since, now is a good moment to decide what you want to keep, and where.
Step 1: download your raw data first
Deleting your account cannot be undone, so download first. Your raw data file is a plain text file listing your genotype at several hundred thousand positions in your DNA. It belongs to you, and it is what independent tools, including ours, analyse. Our step-by-step 23andMe download guide shows where to find it, and there are matching guides for AncestryDNA and MyHeritage. Keep the file somewhere you control, such as an encrypted drive, rather than in your email inbox.
Step 2: withdraw research consent
If you once agreed that your data could be used for research, withdraw that consent in the research and product consents section of your account settings. Withdrawal stops future use, but data already used in completed research cannot be pulled back.
Step 3: ask for your saliva sample to be destroyed
If you chose to have your sample stored, request its destruction in your account preferences. It is a separate step from deleting your data.
Step 4: delete your data
In your account settings, open the section about your 23andMe data, scroll down to the deletion option and choose to delete your data permanently, then confirm from the email you receive. The new owner has said it will honour the existing policies that let customers delete their account and genetic data and opt out of research. Menu labels can change, so the company's help pages describe the current path.
Deletion has limits. Genetic testing companies keep some information to meet legal obligations, and 23andMe has said that it and its contracted laboratory retain some genetic information, your date of birth and your sex for that reason.
Five questions to ask any DNA service before you upload
- Does my raw file leave my device? Some tools analyse it in your browser; others upload it to their servers.
- If it is uploaded, when is it deleted? Look for a precise delay, not "as long as necessary".
- Is my data used for research, shared or sold? And can I say no without losing the service?
- What happens if the company is sold? The 23andMe bankruptcy showed this is not a theoretical question.
- Which law protects me? In the United States, consumer DNA companies are generally not covered by HIPAA, the health privacy law. In the European Union and the United Kingdom, genetic data is a special category of personal data under the GDPR.
Our own answers are in our privacy policy. Our free tools, the secretor status test and the food intolerance test, read your file in your browser without sending it to our servers.
Then put your file to work
Your raw file holds far more than ancestry. Once it is safely stored, you can use it without a new test: our reports read nutrition genes such as MTHFR, FTO, CYP1A2, FADS and APOE from it and turn them into food and lifestyle advice backed by studies. See the reports.
References
- Fortune. California sues 23andMe over alleged lax data security. 29 May 2026.
- Bloomberg Law. 23andMe is back as nonprofit aiming to reach 100 million users. 2026.
- NPR. How to delete your 23andMe data after the company filed for bankruptcy. 25 March 2025.
- TechCrunch. 23andMe files for bankruptcy: how to delete your data. 2025.
- California Department of Justice. Consumer alert for 23andMe customers. 21 March 2025.