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Big Brother’s coming after your dogs: TX apartment will DNA match pet droppings to fine the right owners

Image used with permission by copyright holder

If you thought there wasn’t much you could blame but bad luck when you step on dog poo in the street, think again. An apartment complex in Texas is sick and tired of its tenants’ lazy behavior that it is planning to test the critter litters’ DNAs to match the pile to the correct dog.

The Northside at Legacy apartment in Plano, Texas will begin to require DNA samples from residents with dogs so that if the maintenance team catches any droppings, it could identify the dog and link it back to its owner. Said owner will then be fined $250 for his or her lack of consideration, and may be evicted for repeated offenses. Owners will only have to bring their pets in for a DNA swab from inside the mouth, making the procedure non-invasive but… still pretty invasive. Who wants their poop DNA tested? If we’re gonna go this extreme, why aren’t we doing anything about public urinations by our fellow humans?

The pet waste management system is run by a company called PooPrints who had once pitched its service to entire cities in Texas, but has only attracted a few apartment complexes. The idea is a rather extreme but perhaps necessary conduct in order to get its residents to obey communal rules, claiming that this is all in an effort to improve sanitation and environmental surroundings. Still, the idea doesn’t come without a few raised eyebrows. Is this where DNA testing technology has gotten us outside of paternity tests on day time talk shows and Teen Mom? Yet, we still don’t know who killed John F. Kennedy. Even more interestingly, if more apartments begin to adopt the technology, soon, the world will have a DNA record for almost all dogs. I’m not sure what we’d do with that information except for lost dog registries, but it seems like a pretty wild database to have.

Hate or love the idea, if you want pristine living complexes and don’t plan to raise a big stink about it, The Northside does look like a pretty nice lookin’ complex.

[Image via Shutterstock/mlorenz]

Natt Garun
Former Digital Trends Contributor
An avid gadgets and Internet culture enthusiast, Natt Garun spends her days bringing you the funniest, coolest, and strangest…
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