MyHeritage to be acquired by Francisco Partners

News broke today that MyHeritage is to be acquired by the private equity company Francisco Partners. This is likely to result in new investment in the company so that they can expand their market share. Hopefully genealogists will benefit from the investment and we will eventually see the introduction of lots of new features and products.

You can read more about the acquisition in this article from Business Wire.

There is additional information in this article from TechCrunch.

See also the official press release from MyHeritage.

I expect that we will learn more about the plans for MyHeritage at RootsTech Connect. MyHeritage have a number of talks planned for the show. You can find a full listing on the MyHeritage blog.

Update 13th April 2021

The acquisition was completed on 8th April 2021 following regulatory approval. For details see this blog post from MyHeritage.

RootsTech Connect – the pick of the talks and the final countdown

The clock is ticking away and the virtual doors of RootsTech Connect will soon be open. The Expo Hall goes live at midnight UK time on 24th February so I will have the opportunity to have a quick look around before bedtime. Many of the exhibitors might well have special offers for the show or will be announcing new product launches.

The main website is due to go live four hours later at 4.00 am UK time. I am a night owl but 4.00 am is a bit late even for me so I will be logging on somewhat later in the morning to have a look around. Depending on where you are in the world you might get a chance to check out the website before me. One of the joys of a virtual conference is that we are not restrained by timetables and we can pick and choose the most convenient times to participate. And of course all the content will be available online for the rest of the year.

Making connections will be a key component of the show. There will be a chance to chat online with the exhibitors and most of the presenters through the Connect Chat tool. Each class and all of the exhibitors will have their own dedicated chat rooms.

To get the best out of the event I would suggest making a note of all the speakers and exhibitors you want to connect with so you get a chance to chat during the show. Once the website goes live you will be able to make a playlist of all the talks you want to watch.

I've recorded two talks for RootsTech on "Genetic Genealogy Meets CSI" and "Secrets and Surprises: Uncovering Family History Mysteries Through DNA". Do come along and join me for a chat and I will respond as soon as I can depending on the time difference. 

The main stage sessions will be viewable without signing in but you will need to register and have a FamilySearch account to get the most out of the show. 

There seems to be some confusion about the registration process but I found that I could register through my FamilySearch account. Once you've registered, click on the bell icon for the notifications and your registration will be shown.

There are also seem to be lots of informal groups and chats being set up as people do their best to meet up with friends and try to recreate the experience of attending an event in person.

Debbie's pick of the talks

I've been having a look at the English class schedule which is available from this link on the RootsTech home page. Here are my top picks of the available talks.

DNA talks

These are the DNA talks which I am most looking forward to.

• Reconstructing Parent DNA by Amy Williams, a population geneticist at Cornell University. Check out her website here. 
• How Home DNA Testing Has Redefined Family History by the author Libby Copeland
• Ethical Considerations Using DNA Results by genealogist Lynn Broderick
• The Genetic Consequences of the Transatlantic Slave Trade by Steven Micheletti and Joanna Mountain from 23andMe
• Strengths and Limitations of Genetic Testing for FamilyHistory by population geneticist Ugo Alessandro Perego
• Living DNA: Anthea Ring – Her Story by Esmee Mortimer-Taylor of Living DNA 
• Coretta Scott King School DNA Results Reveal by Esmee Mortimer-Taylor of Living DNA
• AncestryDNA® 103: ThruLines™ and Custom Groups by Brooke Alius and Randon Morford, Ancestry.com

The AncestryDNA talk is intriguing and I wonder if this heralds the launch of a new Custom Groups feature for sorting and filtering our matches. [Update: This talk was in fact just a demonstration of how ThruLines works and how to use the coloured dots on the mobile app to make custom groups.]

There are lots of talks for those of you who are just getting started with DNA testing. Diahan Southard of Your DNA Guide is always an engaging and inspiring speaker. She has a good understanding of the science and has the gift of being able to explain complicated subjects in easy-to-understand language. Diahan has recorded a number of talks for Rootstech and I’m sure they will all be worth watching.

There are talks on the basics of Y-DNA testing from MauriceGleeson, Mags Gaulden and Vivs Laliberte. Janine Cloud from FamilyTreeDNA has a more advanced talk on the BigY test which I am sure will be worth watching. Michelle Leonard has recorded a talk on Understanding X-Chromosome DNA Matching. Ugo Perego has a talk on mitochondrial DNA as well as a talk on his personal genetic genealogy. Ugo used to work for the now defunct Sorenson Molecular Genealogy Foundation so I am sure he will have some interesting insights to share. Look out too for Kitty Cooper's talk on "The Basics of Unknown Parentage Research Using DNA".

Surnames

• Surname Slipups: Baffling Beginnings by Carol Baxter
• Patronymics: The Cause of Common Surnames in Wales by Darris G. Williams

Technology

• Becoming One Worldwide Family by Brian Corrales
• Why Contribute Your Research to a One World Collaborative Tree? by Kitty Cooper
• Exploring Family History Tech with Thomas by Thomas MacEntee
• GEDCOM is ALIVE and Getting SMARTER by Gordon Clarke [This talk has been withdrawn. See Louis Kessler's blog post.]
• A Genealogist’s Secret Weapon: The FamilySearch Research Wiki by Danielle Batson

English genealogy

• English Equity Court Records Dr. Nick Barratt
• English Land Surveys Dr. Nick Barratt
• Manorial Records: How Can They Help My English Research? Celia Heritage
• Success with 17th-Century English Genealogy by Else Churchill

Australia and New Zealand

• From Convict Stain to Royalty by Michelle Patient
• A Census Substitute: Electoral Rolls by Michelle Patient
• Following the Gold Rushes by Michelle Patient
• Whakawhanaungatanga Using DNA by Elena Falla Fowler
• DNA and the Settlers of Taranaki, New Zealand by Donna Rutherford

Further reading

See my previous blog post RootsTech – a global family history show for further information about RootsTech Connect. 

Free upload to MyHeritageDNA from 21st to 28th February 2021

MyHeritage have a very special offer on this week. If you've tested at 23andMe, AncestryDNA, FamilyTreeDNA or Living DNA you can download your raw data and upload to the MyHeritage database to get free access to all the features which are normally only available after paying the upload fee of $29. This includes access to the new Genetic Groups feature. You can see my genetic groups in the screenshot below.

The MyHeritage "ethnicity" estimates have not yet been updated but we are expecting this feature to be revamped later this year. I suspect when that happens my 9.2% Italian ancestry will disappear

MyHeritage have a database of over 4.5 million people and have much better representation in continental Europe than any of the other companies, helped by the fact that they make their website available in many different languages. One of the most useful features at MyHeritage is the ability to filter matches by the countries where your matches live. You will find you get lots of very distant matches from many different countries which are probably not related in a genealogical timeframe but this feature allows you to search for matches in the countries where you do have known relatives. In my case I am primarily focusing on matches in the UK, Australia and New Zealand.

MyHeritage have written a blog post which you can access here with more details about this offer.

Answers to frequently asked questions about uploading data to MyHeritage can be found in their Help Centre.

You can also upload your data directly via this link.

The offer is only available until 28th February so if you've not yet transferred your data I would encourage you to take advantage of the offer while you have the chance.

Investigative genetic genealogy: current methods, knowledge and practice

I spent much of August and September last year collaborating on a big invited review paper on investigative genetic genealogy. I am very pleased to say that the paper successfully went through peer review and has now been published in the journal Forensic Science International: Genetics. The paper is free to read and you can access it via this link.

I worked on the paper with Chris Phillips from the Institute of Forensic Sciences at the University of Santiago de Compostela in Spain and Daniel Kling and Andreas Tillmar who work together at the National Board of Forensic Medicine in Linköping, Sweden. Daniel also has an affiliation with the Department of Forensic Sciences at Oslo University Hospital in Norway. We very fortunate that Oslo University very kindly provided the funding to pay for the paper to be made available open access. It was a pleasure to collaborate with these researchers. We all had complementary knowledge and skills and we have produced a very comprehensive review of investigative genetic genealogy which also highlights areas where future research and validation are needed. The paper is written for an audience of forensic geneticists and is somewhat technical in places but I think much of it will also be of general interest to genetic genealogists.

2020 was a very productive year for me in terms of scientific publications. I collaborated in 2019 with my genetic genealogy friends John Cleary, Maurice Gleeson, Donna Rutherford and Michelle Leonard on a landmark study in collaboration with the forensic science company Eurofins which helped to validate the genealogical methodology used for investigative genetic genealogy. This paper was published in Forensic Science International: Genetics in the May 2020 issue. The cluster-based methods we used for this study are equally valid for family history research. The study was cited in a publication by the UK's Biometrics and Forensics Ethics Group which looked at the potential use of genetic genealogy techniques to assist with solving crimes in the UK.

I also collaborated last year with Gabrielle Samuel from Kings College London on two studies looking at the views of UK stakeholders about investigative genetic genealogy. We found that, although there was considerable support for its use, there were also many ethical concerns raised. While all participants stressed the need for appropriate consent there was less agreement on what the consent process should look like and we concluded that individual consent is not in any case a panacea and that there needs to be societal consent. 

The first of our two papers "The impact of investigative genetic genealogy: perceptions of UK professional and public stakeholders" was published in the September 2020 issue of Forensic Science International: Genetics.

The second paper "Problematising consent: searching genetic genealogy databases for law enforcement purposes" was published online in New Genetics and Society in November 2020.

The above three papers are not available open access. If you would like a copy and don't have institutional access please feel free to write to me.