This content was created by Robert Siciliano. This content was uploaded by Robert Siciliano. This is a YouTube news segment titled "23andMe files for Bankruptcy" (posted May 13, 2025) — a Fox 5 News report by Teresa Priolo. The excerpt features Teresa Priolo and multiple unnamed speakers discussing 23andMe's Chapter 11 filing, its recent troubles (IPO in 2021, layoffs, CEO resignation), the potential risk to roughly 15 million customers' genetic data if the company is sold, distinctions between legal and ethical responsibilities for handling sensitive data, and step‑by‑step advice for customers to delete their data and request destruction of saliva samples via account settings.
Chapters
—for customers who use 23andMe for DNA testing after the company filed for bankruptcy.
At least one state attorney general is urging people to immediately delete their sensitive data and have their genetic material destroyed. Fox 6's Teresa Priolo takes a closer look.
The end is near for 23andMe after a tumultuous few years. The groundbreaking genetics company has filed for Chapter 11.
What they basically said is we need some breathing room. We're going to continue in business. We need to be left alone. We can't be sued. We gotta put a little bit of distance between us and our creditors so we can figure out the best way to move forward.
But in doing so, the company, once viewed as a biotech darling, may ultimately expose 15 million customers to an uncertain future. Whoever buys the company will want its one major asset, its customer data.
There are rules and regulations that our federal government has in in place that require, uh, handling of sensitive information, and the new company will have to do the same thing. However, uh, the— there's a difference between legal responsibility and then ethical and moral responsibilities.
In 2021, the company went public, and since then it's failed to turn a profit or recruit a substantial new user base. It was founded by Anne Wojcicki in 2006, and it promised to revolutionize the future. In November, it announced mass layoffs, and now it's looking to stay afloat as its visionary CEO resigns.
There's no question about it, your data should be deleted. You, you should make sure that any information that whoever the new buyer might be, that they don't have. There's no need for, uh, that data to be transferred to anybody else. It should have never been there in the first place.
In order to delete your data, you must log on to the website and go to settings. You can click that your saliva sample is destroyed or not stored, and able to download your raw data while permanently deleting your data from the site. That way, once the company heads to the auction block, your information isn't at risk. Teresa Priolo, Fox 5 News.
