A member of the US House Intelligence Committee warned that bioweapons are being created that use a target’s DNA to kill just that person.
Speaking at the Aspen Security Forum on Friday, US Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado warned Americans not to be so arrogant about sharing their DNA with private companies because of the arrival of the new type of weapon.
“You can really take someone’s DNA, you know, take their medical profile and you can target a… biological weapon that will kill that person or take that person off the battlefield or render them useless,” Crow said.
The congressman said the development of the weapons is worrisome given the popularity of DNA testing services, where people willingly share their genetic maps with companies to gain insight into their genealogy and health.
“You can’t discuss this without talking about privacy and the protection of commercial data because privacy expectations have deteriorated over the past 20 years,” the Democratic legislator said.
‘Young people actually have very few expectations of privacy, as the polls and data show.’
Crow, a former army guard who has done three missions in Iraq and Afghanistan, continues, “People will spit in a cup very quickly and send it to 23andMe and get really interesting data about their background.”
US Representative Jason Crow of Colorado warned that bioweapons are being made that use a target’s DNA to kill that person alone during the Aspen Security Forum on Friday
The congressman said the development of the weapons was worrisome given the popularity of DNA testing services such as 23andMe
23andMe has repeatedly stated that it does not sell private customer information, but the DNA company is one of several that have provided information to the police upon request
‘Guess what? Their DNA is now owned by a private company. It can be sold with very little intellectual property or privacy protection and we have no legal and regulatory regimes to deal with that.”
“We need to have an open and public discussion about… what the protection of healthcare information, DNA information and your data looks like, because that data is actually obtained and collected by our adversaries for the development of these systems. ‘
23andMe has repeatedly stated that it does not sell private customer information, but the DNA company is one of several that have provided information to the police upon request.
US Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said US rivals could use such DNA bioweapons to attack food supplies on a massive scale.
Ernst warned that biological weapons could be used to attack specific animals on which civilians, troops or cities depend, creating scarcity and food insecurity to weaken humans.
“Food insecurity creates many other uncertainties around the world,” says Ernst.
“There are a number of ways we can look at biological weapons and the need to make sure that we are not only protecting humans, but also the food that will keep us alive.”
US Senator Joni Ernst, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said US rivals could use such DNA bioweapons to attack food supplies on a large scale.
Earlier this week, the Washington Examiner reported how easy it could be to use private databases to develop bioweapons like those touted by Crow.
The publication explained how DNA from a target — or a target’s closest relative — could be stolen and used to create a biological weapon that was effective only against that person.
That technology could lead to highly targeted murder programs and also make it much harder for killers to be tracked down.
Similar technology could be harnessed against American agriculture by designing weapons that target only a particular breed of farm animal or crop.
That could plunge the country into starvation and bring the US to its knees in hostilities from a rival like Russia or China.
Army General Richard Clark, commander of the US Special Operations Command, emphasized how Russia had already been disgraced with a less sophisticated version of the same plan.
About the nerve agent poisoning of former double agent Sergei Skripal in England in 2018, he said: “Russia is ready to use it against political opponents. They are willing to use them on their own soil, but to get on the soil of a NATO ally in the UK and use it… and as we go into the future we need to be prepared for those eventualities.
“And I think we don’t talk about it as much as we should and look for ways to continue fighting.”
Skripal and his daughter Yulia were poisoned with the nerve agent Novichok in the English town of Salisbury and nearly died of their injuries. Then British Prime Minister Theresa May blamed Russia for the outrage days later.
Last year, US Senator Marco Rubio sounded the alarm that Russian and Chinese labs were processing Americans’ DNA tests through Medicare and Medicaid.
“It’s ridiculous that our current policies allow the Chinese Communist Party to access Americans’ genomic data,” Rubio said in a statement.
“There is absolutely no reason that Beijing, which routinely tries to undermine US national security, should get the genomic data of US citizens.
In 2018, Ancestry, 23andMe, Habit, Helix, and MyHeritage signed on to the policy prepared with the help of The Future of Privacy Forum, a non-profit organization, to support “promoting responsible data practices in support of emerging technologies.” according to Gizmodo.
The guidelines, titled Privacy Best Practices for Consumer Genetic Testing Services and released Tuesday address scenarios where users’ personally identifiable and anonymous genetic information could be shared with law enforcement (without a warrant) and other third parties.
The new voluntary policy calls for separate consent from users before sharing “individual-level information” with other companies and for greater transparency about the number of data requests received and fulfilled by law enforcement agencies.
While all companies have indicated that they agree to these standards of practice, there is no law enforcing the rules.