§2000ff–1 Employer practices

Summary

Employers must not use a person’s genetic information to decide about hiring, firing, pay, job duties, or other workplace treatment. They also must not separate or classify workers in ways that hurt their job chances because of genetic information. Employers may not ask for, require, or buy genetic information about an employee or the employee’s family, except in six limited situations: an accidental request for family medical history; genetic or health services the employer offers if the employee gives written, voluntary permission and only the employee and health professional see identifiable results while the employer gets only non‑identifying summary data; asking family medical history to meet leave certification rules; buying public printed materials (like newspapers or books) that include family medical history; genetic monitoring for workplace toxins if employees are told in writing, give written consent (or the testing is required by law), get their individual results, the program follows federal or state rules, and the employer only sees anonymous group results; and DNA testing by forensic or human‑remains labs only to check for sample contamination using identification markers. Even when an exception applies, the employer still cannot use the information to discriminate or disclose it in ways the law forbids.