Protecting Privacy in Genetic Databases

Abstract

Many countries around the world are currently putting a lot of effort and resources into genetic technology. Australia is no exception. This initiative is seen as particularly important in order to "improve the health of the Australian population, to build economy and to create valuable job" [6]. The expectations from genetic research are immense and wide ranging. They include improvement in diagnosis of disease, detection of genetic predisposition to disease, development in gene therapy and the design of drugs tailored to an individual's genetic make-up [21]. Therefore, genetic research is currently receiving vast amount of funding.