Thus, I’ve gone from no information about Sam to knowing that he is related through Hiram’s maternal grandfather. Because this match shares DNA with “Close Maternal Match” and “Maternal Match,” and because I know what line these two maternal matches share on Hiram with, I can estimate that Sam is related through Hiram’s maternal grandfather. Indeed, with this match I can estimate even better than maternal vs. I am VERY confident that this is a maternal match. Sure enough, Sam matches Hiram’s sister (which doesn’t help us at all), and three different maternal relatives, including his maternal uncle: I might, however, be able to learn something about him by checking out the Shared Matches: But with the username “Sam” and no tree, identifying this person is nearly impossible. The following individual, Sam, shares 37 cM with Hiram. But we’re looking for any clue we can find to shed light on a match. Of course this is not a foolproof method, and identifying a match as maternal or paternal only eliminates 50% of Hiram’s family tree. NOTE: I’ll only use this method for close matches (at least 15-20 cM shared), since I know that below 10 cM, I fail to share 41% of my matches with my parents. Although I wasn’t able to test Hiram’s mother or father, I am very confident that I can label each of his close matches as being maternal or paternal based on these aunt/uncle tests.
In addition, several of Hiram’s other maternal relatives have tested. Luckily, I’ve also tested three of his mother’s siblings (an uncle and two aunts). If you’ve tested other close family members, or if you’ve identified many of your AncestryDNA matches, then you can leverage this information to help identify your unknown genetic matches using the Shared Matches tool.įor example, I’ve tested a close family member we’ll call Hiram and I would like to identify some of Hiram’s matches that don’t have a tree attached or an identifiable profile name. Use KNOWN matches to identify UNKNOWN matches.But it’s better than no tree at all.ĭon’t miss out on these valuable matches! The person DOES have a tree that you can review:Īre we 100% sure that this is the correct tree of the person that tested? Nope. Missing these trees is an enormous missed opportunity.įor example, the following match appears to have no tree attached:īut when you click on the profile, you see the following. In a recent study, I found that 22% of my first 500 matches have an unlinked public tree available! (See “ Quantifying Tree Availability for My AncestryDNA Matches”). Many of these matches have an unattached family tree in their profile. In fact, it only means that there is no family tree attached to the DNA. (All names and identifying information were changed!)Ī big mistake people make is to assume that the words “No family tree” next to a match means that no family tree is available. The next best way to maintain some level of DNA privacy is to make your information as private as possible, as we will see below.īelow are some of the ways we can use the information we’re given to identify our AncestryDNA matches.
The only way to maintain 100% DNA privacy is to not take a DNA test. The purpose of genetic genealogy is identification. EVERY test-taker has a right to make their information as private as possible but you must also understand that DNA is inherently identifiable. The second purpose, which is perhaps even more important, is to help test-takers who want privacy understand the ways in which people can use information to identify them. Keep in mind, some people have very good reasons for not having a public tree (they don’t have one, there’s a bad history, and so on), so this post is not at all about chastising people who don’t have a tree. The first purpose is to help people identify their AncestryDNA matches even if the match has no tree, has a private tree, has a meagre tree, and/or is not communicating. Today we’ll look at some of the ways we can learn more about matches using the limited information we are given.īut this post has a two-fold purpose. We all know that it can be frustrating trying to identify who a genetic match is and how they are related to us.
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