Your Privacy

For Ancestry Customers: Ancestry customers can reach us using these phone numbers, or you may submit questions using this web form.

16.  AncestryHealth® Additional Privacy Statement (US Customers Only)

The Ancestry Privacy Statement describes the general privacy practices of Ancestry’s Services including the AncestryHealth® Service. More information specific to the AncestryHealth® Service is provided in this Section. You can also access Ancestry’s Privacy Center for additional details on Ancestry’s privacy practices here.

16.1.  What Information Does Ancestry Collect Through Your Use of the AncestryHealth® Service?

We collect the following information from you to provide the AncestryHealth® Service, which includes Health Activation Information, Your Health History, Family Health History and DNA Data (as defined above). This information, along with other information specified in the Ancestry Privacy Statement, is collectively referred to here as your “Personal Information”.

Health Activation Information

When you activate your Health DNA kit, we may collect the following (referred to as “Health Activation Information”):

• Tube code;
• Name;
• Date of Birth;
• Biological sex;
• Street Address;
• Phone number;
• Email address;
• Purpose or reason for taking the test;
• Whether you are a stem cell or bone marrow transplant recipient; and,
• Information about current and past health history of you and your family, such as doctor diagnosed conditions, carrier status, and lifestyle choices that may have an impact on your health (“Your Health History”).

Family Health History

We collect personal and health history information about your family members (“Family Health History”) which you have voluntarily contributed to your AncestryHealth® account. The information collected may include:

• Relationship;
• Name;
• Age;
• Living / Deceased;
• Condition(s);
• Age of diagnosis; and,
• Additional notes provided by user.

16.2.  How Does Ancestry Use Your Personal Information?

Health Activation Information

Ancestry uses your Health Activation Information to:

• Support and facilitate:
  • The determination of eligibility for the AncestryHealth® Service; and,
  • The patient-physician relationship with the independent physician network, which is provided as part of the AncestryHealth® Service.
• Process your AncestryHealth® kit and deliver personalized health reports to you.

Your Health History

Ancestry uses Your Health History information to:

• Provide information to the independent physician network so they may determine your eligibility for the test(s), and identify possible health issues or factors which may impact the results of your test; and,
• Deliver a personalized experience.

Ancestry may also use Your Health History information in a de-identified format to improve, update and expand the AncestryHealth® Service.

Family Health History

Ancestry may use your Family Health History information to deliver a personalized experience. Ancestry may also use your Family Health History information in a de-identified format to improve our AncestryHealth® Service and identify new product offerings.

Genetic Information and Health Reports

If the independent physician network partner approves your laboratory test, and, depending on which AncestryHealth® product you buy and whether we have your DNA Data from prior testing, Ancestry will either share your DNA Data, or send your sample for processing to our independent laboratory partner. Using your DNA Data, our independent laboratory partner will generate a test result, which Ancestry, in turn, will use to provide your health report.

Ancestry’s independent physician network will also have access to your test result and health report.

Please note: As addressed in our Privacy Statement, Ancestry commits not to share any Personal Information of AncestryHealth® Users with insurance companies, employers, or third party marketers. Ancestry does not voluntarily cooperate with law enforcement. To provide our Users with the greatest protection under the law, we require all government agencies seeking access to Ancestry customers’ data to follow a valid legal process, and do not allow law enforcement to use Ancestry’s services to investigate crimes or to identify human remains.

16.3.  When Do We Share Your Information and Who Are the Recipients?

Ancestry will share your Health Activation Information, Your Health History, test results, health report, and any questions you submit through the “Submit a Question” feature with the independent physician network who has been appointed as part of the AncestryHealth® Service. The independent physician network will use this information to determine your eligibility for the test, to review and provide oversight of the health reports, as well as to assist in providing genetic counseling services to you.

Please note: The use of your information by the independent physician network, PWNHealth, will be subject to their Terms of Use and Notice of Privacy Practices.

16.4.  Your Choices and Access to your Personal Information

You may access your AncestryHealth® results and reports at any time, through the AncestryHealth® product. You may also download your DNA data obtained from the micro-array technology used to provide you AncestryHealth® test results free of charge from your DNA test settings page. If you have purchased AncestryHealth® with next generation sequencing (“NGS”), there may be additional charges to download your NGS DNA Data once the download feature becomes available.

16.5.  What Are Ancestry’s Retention Practices for the AncestryHealth® Service?

Ancestry will retain the Personal Information you provided to the AncestryHealth® Service until you tell us to delete it. This is to ensure that you always have access to your test results, health reports, and to the physician network service which is included as part of the AncestryHealth® Service. In addition, if you have purchased an update to the AncestryHealth® Service, you may be entitled to receive results to new tests as they become available, and Ancestry will need access to your Personal Information in order to provide this service.

Please note that our laboratory partners are required to retain your data for a period of at least ten (10) years, or as required by state law and the Clinical Laboratory Improvements Act (CLIA) and the guidelines that apply to laboratories certified by the College of American Pathologists (CAP). The independent physician network will retain your Personal Information as required by applicable laws and regulations and subject to their Terms of Use and Notice of Privacy Practices.

17.  California Resident Additional Privacy Statement

Ancestry provides this California Resident Additional Privacy Statement (“California Statement”), applicable solely to California residents, as a supplement to our Privacy Statement, to provide information as to how you may exercise your rights under the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”). This California Statement covers all Ancestry websites, services, and mobile apps that link to this California Statement, including: Ancestry®, AncestryDNA®, AncestryHealth®, Fold3®, Newspapers.com™, Archives®, We Remember®, and Find a Grave® (throughout, collectively, as applicable “Ancestry” “we” or “our”). It applies to the Personal Information (defined above) we collect from your use of our Services and through any other means by which you engage with us.

17.1  Categories of Personal Information

Ancestry collects, and has collected in the 12 months prior to the effective date of this California Statement, the following categories of Personal Information:

• Identifiers, such as name, postal address, unique personal identifier, online identifier, Internet Protocol address, your mobile device identifier, email address, account name, driver’s license.
• Categories of personal information described in subdivision (e) of Section 1798.80 not covered by an existing category (medical information, physical characteristics or descriptions).
• Characteristics of protected classes under California or federal law, such as biological sex and year of birth, and, if you are an AncestryDNA® or AncestryHealth® customer, medical conditions. This also includes any other User Provided Content (defined above) you choose to share with us that is considered a legally protected class under California or federal law.
• Commercial information, such as products or services purchased, obtained, or considered or other purchasing or consuming histories or tendencies.
• Biometric information, such as DNA Data (defined above).
• Internet usage information, such as your browsing history, search history, and information regarding your interaction with our sites and advertisements (also described above).
• Geolocation data, such as location of your device or computer and any metadata associated with digital photographs uploaded to Find a Grave®, including the location, date, and time the photo was taken.
• Sensory data, such as audio, electronic, and visual information (e.g., recordings of calls with Ancestry Member Services or information you voluntarily share when doing consumer insights research with us).
• Inferences derived from Personal Information, such as to suggest familial relationships and to create consumer profiles for the purposes of research, product development and marketing. Please note as stated in Section 17.6 below, we do not sell your Personal Information.

Note that some categories of information are collected only if you use certain of our Services.

17.2  Business Purposes

Ancestry uses the categories of Personal Information described in Section 17.1 for the following business purposes:

• Providing, personalizing, improving, updating, and expanding Ancestry’s Services;
• Communicating to you about the Services; and
• Marketing new products and offers from us or our business partners based on your interests.

17.3  Categories of Sources of Personal Information

Ancestry collects, and has collected in the 12 months prior to the effective date of this California Statement, categories of Personal Information described in Section 17.1 from the following categories of sources:

• You, our user/visitor—this source of Personal Information depends on your use of the Services, including your User Provided Content (defined above);
• Our affiliates, including, but not limited to our related brands: AncestryDNA®, AncestryHealth®, Fold3®, Newspapers.com™, Archives®, We Remember®, and Find a Grave®;
• Public records;
• Historical records; and,
• Third parties.

17.4  Categories of Third-Parties with Whom We Share Personal Information

Ancestry shares, and has shared in the 12 months prior to the effective date of this California Statement, with the following categories of third parties the correlating categories of Personal Information:

17.5  Exercising Your Rights Under CCPA.

17.5.1  Exercising Your Rights Under CCPA. The CCPA gives California consumers the right to request that we disclose what Personal Information we collect, use, disclose, or sell. This includes the right to request the categories of Personal Information we have collected about them, the categories of sources of Personal Information, the business purpose for collecting Personal Information, the categories of third parties with whom we share categories of Personal Information, and the specific pieces of Personal Information we have collected about the requestor.

If you are submitting a request to know on your own behalf, there are two ways to make your request: online or by email.

To submit your request to know online:

1. Log into your Ancestry account.
2. Go to your Account Settings.
3. Click on “How do I download my account data?” and follow those instructions.

For your convenience, here are step-by-step instructions on how to download your account data.

To email your request to know, email us at ccpasupport@ancestry.com. We are required to verify your identity before providing you with a copy of your data. We will require you to provide proof of identity and California address (e.g., you may be required to provide a copy of your government ID, which will be used solely to verify your identity and address).

Please note: In response to a request to know under the CCPA, we will not provide unique biometric information to you. Your DNA Data belongs to you and you may download it at any time. If you download your DNA Data, you do so at your own risk. Learn how here.

If you are an “Authorized Agent” pursuant to the CCPA and are submitting a request to know on behalf of one of our users, see Section 17.5.3 below.

17.5.2  Right to Delete. The CCPA gives California consumers the right to request that we delete your Personal Information.

If you are submitting a request to delete on your own behalf, there are two ways to make your request: online or by email. Note that to delete your Personal Information, you must delete your account and that once an account deletion request is completed, this process is irreversible. Your information (including, but not limited to, family trees, records, photos, DNA Data and AncestryHealth® results) will be permanently deleted.

To submit your request for deletion online:

1. Log into your Ancestry account.
2. Go to your Account Settings.
3. Click on “How do I delete my account?” and follow those instructions.

For your convenience, here are step-by-step instructions on how to delete your account.

To email your request to delete, email us at ccpasupport@ancestry.com. We are required to verify your identity before we delete your data. We will require you to provide proof of identity and California address (e.g., you may be required to provide a copy of your government ID, which will be used solely to verify your identity and address).

If you are an “Authorized Agent” pursuant to the CCPA and are submitting a request to know on behalf of one of our users, see Section 17.5.3 below.

17.5.3  Authorized Agents. The CCPA allows California residents to use “authorized agents” to make requests to know and requests for deletion. To use an authorized agent, email us at thirdpartyauthorizationrequests@ancestry.com. Note that even if a consumer chooses to use an authorized agent for a request, the consumer will still need to work directly with us to provide items 3 and 4 below:

1. Proof that the authorized agent is registered with the Secretary of State to conduct business in California.
2. Signed permission from the consumer allowing the authorized agent to act on the consumer’s behalf.
3. Verification of the consumer’s identity (to be made directly by the consumer to us). We will require proof of identity and California address (e.g., a copy of your government ID, which will be used solely to verify your identity and address).
4. Confirmation that the consumer provided the authorized agent permission to submit the request to be confirmed directly by the consumer to us.

Please note: In response to a request to know under the CCPA, we will not provide unique biometric information about the consumer to an authorized agent or to the consumer. If the consumer wants to download DNA Data, see Section 17.5.1 above.

17.6  Selling. Ancestry does not sell your Personal Information, and has not sold it in the 12 months prior to the effective date of this California Statement.

17.7  Non-discrimination. We will not discriminate against you for exercising any of your rights under the CCPA.

17.8  California’s Shine the Light Law. California Civil Code Section 1798.83, known as the “Shine the Light” law, permits Users who are California residents to request and obtain from us a list of what Personal Information (if any) we disclosed to third parties for their direct marketing purposes in the preceding calendar year and the names and addresses of those third parties. Requests may be made only once a year and are free of charge. Under Section 1798.83, Ancestry currently does not share any Personal Information with third parties for their own direct marketing purposes.

17.9  Contact Us. If you have questions about our CCPA or California-related privacy policies or practices, please contact us at ccpasupport@ancestry.com.