A House Intelligence Committee member has warned Americans to refrain from excessively sharing their DNA due to the possibility that their genetic information could be used for bioweapons targeting specific groups, Fox News reported.
According to Democratic Representative Jason Crow, far too many young people are willing to share their genetic information with private companies.
"You can't have a discussion about this without talking about privacy and the protection of commercial data because expectations of privacy have degraded over the last 20 years," he said at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado on Friday. "Young folks actually have very little expectation of privacy, that's what the polling and the data show."
Specifically, Crow pointed at the company 23andMe, which uses DNA samples to provide information about one’s background. According to the lawmaker, the private company may sell the gathered genetic information, but 23andMe has denied the accusations.
Another lawmaker, Republican Senator Joni Ernst, echoed Crow’s sentiment and claimed that the technology may be used by US adversaries to target livestock and trigger famine. Additionally, Ernst asserted, enemies of the US are exploring the possibility of pairing AI and drone technology for the battlefield.
"It's not just the one-offs that are being purchased on the internet, but now we have near-peer adversaries that are developing swarm technology where they can use 100 or 200 different drones — highly, highly evolved drones that can attack our service members on the battlefield," Ernst said at the forum.