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Iceland Develops Incest App, Warns People of Possible Ancestral Ties

By Cheri Cheng | Update Date: Apr 18, 2013 11:56 AM EDT

Incest is often viewed as an outdated practice that occurred thousands of years ago when royal families attempted to preserve their royal lines. Although incest was perceived as normal during those times, it is definitely far from the norm in modern day society, with science listing all of the health complications that arise due to incestuous relationships. Due to society's aversion to incest, some areas in the world that are extremely small and more vulnerable to incest, have found ways to avoid accidentally falling into an incestuous pairing. The most recent invention is the incest app from Iceland, which informs people whether or not their potential partner is too closely related.

Iceland's newest app, titled "Islendingabók," which translates to the book of Icelanders, will inform people whether or not the people they are interested in are too genetically close. The app works by allowing its users to access a bloodline registry that measures genetic relationships between people living in Iceland, which has a small population. If two users tap their phones together, the app, with the slogan of "bump the app before you bump in bed," will determine whether or not romance is a good idea.

The app taps into a database that contains over 1,200 years of genealogical information gathered since 1997. According to sources, before the development of this app, people who were concerned about possible genetic connections with one another searched databases that required them to put in their names and Icelandic ID numbers. This process could become very hard to do during the heat of the moment, which is why this app can become extremely useful.

Although this app might not pertain to other locations in the world, Iceland has reported to have higher risks of incest due to its small group of resident. There are nearly 300,000 people living on the island, and not that many people leave or enter it, which increases the possibility of accidentally romancing a close relative. Fortunately for them, the fear of marrying a second cousin might be slightly diminished with this new app.

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