JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Your family history may not be what you think it is. That is the reality one local man says he had to come to terms with after taking not one, but two ancestry DNA tests that told very different stories about who he is.
It is not a rare situation. More than 29 million people have used services like Ancestry, and as more people test and more data is collected, some users are noticing something unexpected. Their results are changing over time.
Frank Bennett did not go looking for answers about his ancestry. They came looking for him. He spends much of his time writing paranormal novels and collecting childhood memorabilia, living what he describes as a quiet life. That changed when he got a message from an old friend who told him she believed her daughter might be his.
“Out of the blue, she found me on Facebook and said that I believe my daughter might be yours,” Frank said.
That moment pushed him to take a DNA test through Ancestry, hoping to get clarity. The test ruled out paternity, but it opened the door to something else entirely. For the first time, Frank began questioning what he thought he knew about himself.
“And I was surprised to find that I was only two percent Italian,” he said.
That result did not match the identity he had grown up with. For years, he had believed his Italian heritage was a core part of who he was. Instead, the test showed that more than half of his ancestry traced back to Germany.
“As for being Italian, I went around and told a lot of people I do things because I’m Italian,” he said.
The results did not sit right with him. So five years later, he decided to test again.
“I thought maybe they need a second shot at it. Maybe there’s a flaw in the testing,” Frank said.
The second test told a completely different story. This time, his results showed 40 percent Italian ancestry, along with more than 30 percent tied to regions across Germany and France. The dramatic shift left him confused and searching for answers.
“It may be possible, like the phrase goes, you are what you eat. Maybe perhaps I ate so much pasta or pizza in the past five years, I just became Italian,” he joked.
According to experts at Ancestry, Frank’s DNA had not changed as it seemed.
“Your DNA doesn’t change. Your DNA is static,” said Crista Cowan. “However, how that DNA gets compared or interpreted does change as the science continues to advance.”
Cowan says as more people submit DNA samples, the company’s database grows, giving scientists more information to work with and allowing for more refined results over time.
“What happens then is as the reference panel increases, we can add more shades,” she explained. “Now, we’re comparing your DNA, same DNA, to this new color palette.”
In other words, the story your DNA tells can become more detailed as the science improves, even if the DNA itself never changes.
For Frank, that explanation isn’t so convincing.
“It is what it is whether it’s measured in 2020 or 2026. The ingredients should not be subject to change,” he said.
He believes companies should be more upfront about how those changes can happen, especially for people using these tests to answer deeply personal questions or solve family mysteries.
“Make the language a little larger on the fine print,” he said.
Cowan, though, acknowledges that experiences vary.
“We see stories almost every day here at Ancestry,” she said. “People who take an ancestry DNA test and it completely aligns with what they knew about their family history. And then conversely, you see people who make brand new discoveries.”
Frank’s experience falls somewhere in the middle. His results did not give him all the certainty he was looking for, but for him, the biggest takeaway is that he’s just happy to be here... no matter what his genetic makeup is.
If you have already taken a test through Ancestry, experts say those updates are happening whether you notice them or not. Users are typically notified when new reference panel updates are released.
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