Ancestry Privacy

[Rusty]

I saw something yesterday that has now gone AWOL so I can't provide a link but I was wondering if anyone else had seen it. If I read it right Ancestry has now come out in the open and admitted that they own everything that we upload onto their website. If I've read it wrong apologies to Ancestry but I always had a feeling that buried away in the small print was something about Ancestry owning our trees and the information on them.

Did anyone else see this 'news' article, I think that it only came out within the last few days.

[ozgirl]

Ancestry recently updated their Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions. Here are links to the upgraded version.

https://www.ancestry.co.uk/cs/legal/privacystatement?o_xid=116123&o_lid=116123&o_sch=Email+Campaigns

https://www.ancestry.co.uk/cs/legal/termsandconditions?o_xid=116123&o_lid=116123&o_sch=Email+Campaigns

[bubblebelle]

Yes, there was a post in Generations Cafe about it. Hopefully this will take you to a link that explains the change in wording.

One big change at Ancestry | The Legal Genealogist

[PhotoFamily]

Yes, there was a post in Generations Cafe about it. Hopefully this will take you to a link that explains the change in wording.

One big change at Ancestry | The Legal Genealogist

I've always thought that what you put on a public website is just that, public, and you shouldn't count on it not be proliferated in ways that you can't control.

I don't see the Legal Genealogist recommending any action.

[cbcarolyn]

I've always thought that what you put on a public website is just that, public, and you shouldn't count on it not be proliferated in ways that you can't control.

I don't see the Legal Genealogist recommending any action.

I would have thought that too, mostly the things on my Ancestry are their records that I have linked to my tree, with a few other documents added in, not sure what I am seeing as a problem. I wonder what Ancestry could really do with it, it's pretty much worthless, apart from me and a handful of people that have the same relatives as me.

[bubblebelle]

deleted

[GallowayLass]

I don’t see why ancestry should have any rights of ownership over any trees or personal files/images that its members upload. Fair enough if they decide in the future to withdraw any images from datasets they own or have agreements with the owners even it that means the link you have in your tree becomes broken. Members’ personal uploads though should never outright belong to ancestry.
When this comes into force, even if you delete any images, trees or even cancel your membership permanently, anything that was once on their server will be claimed as theirs forever to do whatever they like with.
Why can’t they just be happy with hosting their members’ data?

[Caroline]

I've always thought that what you put on a public website is just that, public, and you shouldn't count on it not be proliferated in ways that you can't control.

I don't see the Legal Genealogist recommending any action.

https://www.legalgenealogist.com/202...e-at-ancestry/ - she is teling us to take care, as we should anywhere we out anything online.

Needless to say, Twitter is tweeting away about it all as is Facebook so well worth having a look over there. There is a lot of panic and babies going out with the bathwater.

[PhotoFamily]

I just had this email from the WikiTree England Project:
====================
Anyone who has a tree on Ancestry needs to read this, especially if you have uploaded family photos to this tree.

Ancestry have changed their Terms and Conditions so that any images uploaded from now on are permanently and irrevocably theirs to do what they want with.

If you have uploaded any images before the 3rd August (the date they changed the T&Cs), you have 30 days from that date to remove your images or they will be grandfathered in to the new T&Cs.

I was alerted to this by a post on Roberta Estes' blog "The clock is ticking: in 28 days Ancestry can do anything they want with every image in your tree"

link to that blog didn't copy:
https://dna-explained.com/2021/08/04...-in-your-tree/
====================

But, the various photos and more that I put on public trees have been copied. If I remove my original, doesn't that still leave Ancestry with the use of all the copies? And there are photos that I shared with cousins, not thru Ancestry, that the cousins put into private trees. What about those?

Crazy.

[cbcarolyn]

I am confused, I think I must be missing the point - what difference will it mean the fact that they 'own' them - they have no value. They were already 'cashing in' on them before if the tree was public, as others could add to their tree, making the catalogue kind of bigger. And then they are only of value to a handful of people that have interest in my tree. I don't think I have anything that is unique to me, just an odd pic or 2 of a relative, but its nice to share. Better than sitting in a box in the loft and not a soul seeing them. In fact I have tried to share them with relatives and they are not interested.

Although I am also not sure why they needed to change to say that they own them.

[Anne in Carlisle]

I agree Carolyn. Photos I have put on my public tree are there for anyone to use, that's why I put them there. They are my relatives but also those of many others. I am very careful to only use photos that I am sure I know who they are because there are very many unidentified photos out there. I have no problem with anyone, including Ancestry, using them for whatever purpose they wish, including selling them for millions (ha ha ha!). Nothing changes the fact that I know who they are and I have copies of my own.

To be honest I didn't think much had changed in the terms. I had always thought that Ancestry claimed ownership of the material. It doesn't mean that I have 'lost' all the stuff, just that it's available to all, which has always been my aim so that it will still be out there once I am gone. I don't need the work attributed to me at all, just that it is freely available.
Anne

[cbcarolyn]

...I am pretty sure once I am gone my immediate family will have no interest, so I think it is nice that maybe someone will find it on Ancestry, or maybe even my son in 30 years time, when he does have an interest, and all my local stuff has been thrown/broken tech/lost. It's a bit like putting them in a vault!

[AntonyM]

The T&Cs of Ancestry have always given them ownership rights to anything you uploaded - although from the social media reaction in the last day or two I don't think a lot of users realised it before.

What has changed is making that ownership "perpetual" and non-revocable".

My guess is that they realised that without that addition they had a difficulty if someone removed something they had uploaded which had been copied into numerous other users trees - they would have to track and then delete every copy, or copy of a copy, that had been gathered into other trees through hints etc. That would be a huge task.

This now means they don't have to do that.

[cbcarolyn]

The T&Cs of Ancestry have always given them ownership rights to anything you uploaded - although from the social media reaction in the last day or two I don't think a lot of users realised it before.

What has changed is making that ownership "perpetual" and non-revocable".

My guess is that they realised that without that addition they had a difficulty if someone removed something they had uploaded which had been copied into numerous other users trees - they would have to track and then delete every copy, or copy of a copy, that had been gathered into other trees through hints etc. That would be a huge task.

This now means they don't have to do that.

that makes sense, and there must be even the woolly area where people download and then upload again. i have done that before as have cropped it, turned it. tidied it etc, then it looks like I have initiated it which I can't do anything about.

[cbcarolyn]

I would say if it hadn't been for ancestry i would never have had some of the documents and knowledge on my tree, so I feel quite happy to pay it forward to others, and if that means Ancestry also has to own them that is fine by me

[Caroline]

Making Our Terms and Conditions Clearer: Modifications to our August 2021 Update

The underlined section is the new bit -

Notwithstanding the non-revocable and perpetual nature of this license, it terminates when your User Provided Content is deleted from our systems. Be aware that to the extent you elected to make your User Provided Content “public” and other users copied or saved it to the Services, this license continues until the content has been deleted both by you and the other users.*

- and then it continues to explain the change.

[Caroline]

https://www.legalgenealogist.com/2021/08/06/ancestry-retreats/

[Caroline]

https://thednageek.com/the-molehill-...Guq7ZwFPD1i7jg - putting it all into perspective. 😀

[cbcarolyn]

all makes sense to me, wow I hadn't realised people would delete their trees, what a shame and how sad for them.

[PhotoFamily]

all makes sense to me, wow I hadn't realised people would delete their trees, what a shame and how sad for them.

Presumably they backed up their trees before deleting...

A year or two after I started researching (and using Ancestry) I realized that Ancestry was making money off of my labour, but I was paying them. After all, people were using my tree information and photos, and they were paying ancestry to get them. Yes, the same is true on other sites too.