China’s largest genomics company’s U.S. operations announced Thursday, following years of warnings from intelligence officials that the Chinese government is collecting genetic information on Americans and others in ways that could undermine national security. Bipartisan bills have been introduced in both houses of Congress that would effectively ban the .
The bill, sponsored by leaders of the House Select Committee on the Communist Party of China and the Senate Committee on Homeland Security, targets BGI, formerly known as the Beijing Genomics Institute, which is a Chinese military company in 2021. is on the Department of Defense’s blacklist. Five of the company’s affiliates have also been sanctioned by the Commerce Department, and at least two of them have been accused of misusing genetic information against China’s ethnic minorities.
In an exclusive interview with NBC News, Rep. Mike Gallagher, Republican of Wisconsin, and Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthy, Democrat of Illinois, said both bills would bar BGI and any companies using its technology from federal contracts. said. The company said in a statement that it would “remove BGI from the U.S. market.”
BGI “continues to be the leading supplier of genetic sequencing equipment in the U.S. market,” Gallagher said. “We think that’s a bad idea. And that’s what we’re trying to prevent.”
A similar bill was introduced in the Senate by Homeland Security Committee Chairman Gary Peters (D-Mich.) and Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tennessee). Supporters say the bill has a good chance of becoming law because it has bipartisan and bicameral support.
“This bill will protect Americans’ personal health and genetic information from foreign adversaries who have the ability and motivation to use it to undermine our national security,” Peters told NBC News. Ta.
BGI said in a statement: “While we fully support the protection of personal data, the bill that would effectively exclude BGI from the U.S. market fails to achieve this goal and would instead restrict competition and increase health care costs. “This will limit access to technology.”
The company said, “BGI does not operate clinical laboratories or collect patient samples, and does not have access to personal or genetic data.” It has nothing to do with it,” he said.
Krishnamoorthi said the evidence suggests otherwise.
“BGI has extensive cooperation with the People’s Liberation Army,” he said. “They published a number of papers in collaboration with the People’s Liberation Army on that research. And this kind of military-civil fusion happens often. [People’s Republic of China]This is particularly concerning when it comes to collecting data on Americans that could be used for PLA research. ”
BGI and its subsidiaries spent $420,000 on lobbying in 2023, according to Open Secret, a group that tracks lobbying spending.
A 2021 investigation by Reuters found that BGI’s popular prenatal test, which was taken by millions of pregnant women around the world (excluding the United States), was developed in collaboration with the Chinese military and that the company used it to collect genetic data. concluded that it had been used.
The U.S. National Counterintelligence and Security Center responded to the Reuters report, saying, “Non-invasive prenatal testing kits sold by Chinese biotech companies serve an important medical function, but they are separate from the People’s Republic of China and Chinese biotech companies.” “There is also the possibility that it may provide a mechanism for to collect genetic and genomic data from around the world,” the center said.
A February 2021 Counterintelligence Center bulletin warned that China “has been able to access U.S. medical data, including genomic data, through a variety of channels, both legal and illegal, for many years.” . The bulletin added that the collection “poses serious risks not only to Americans’ privacy but to America’s economy and national security as well.”
Bill Evanina, who retired as the U.S. government’s top counterintelligence official in 2021, said he worked for years to raise the alarm about genetic data collection by BGI and other Chinese companies. He compared BGI to China’s 5G telecom giant, which was kicked out of the U.S. market due to espionage risks.
“From a biotech perspective, BGI is no different than Huawei,” he said. “It is this legitimate business that masks the collection of information for illicit purposes.”
Evanina explained the multi-layered risks posed by genetic data when combined with other personal data that the United States claims was stolen by Chinese intelligence. One is economic. China has the potential to make strides in its cutting-edge biotechnology industry, which is expected to revolutionize healthcare.
“Genomics and DNA are the new oil. This is a $4 trillion industry,” Evanina said.
But Evanina and Gallagher say China could use genetic data to create targeted biological weapons that are effective against one group of people but not others. He said there are concerns.
“It also extends to the threat of custom-built biological weapons that can target individuals or specific groups. And for you. [readers] “You’d think it would be science fiction or something from the distant future, but it’s not,” Gallagher said. “We know that it’s a technology that…the Chinese Communist Party wants to perfect.”
There are also concerns that China, which has not fully embraced Western medical ethics, may seek to use genetics to enhance human capabilities, including for military purposes. Evanina pointed to reports that China has studied the genetic information of people living high in the Himalayas with the aim of “enhancing the capabilities” of Chinese soldiers who must fight at high altitudes.
Another concern is that genetic information could be used to target vulnerable Americans for espionage.
“Let’s just say they had the ability to say, ‘Oh, look at Bill Evanina.’ OK, we found out from all these data breaches that he was behind on his mortgage. . He lost his job. He has two kids in college. Oh, he has genetic sequence markers. It indicates that he is prone to hepatitis or Parkinson’s disease. He’s very vulnerable. ”
According to Evanina, this threat is not theoretical. He said U.S. spy agencies were collecting evidence of China’s malicious intent regarding genetic material.
“We know this because we are secretly collecting this data from them,” he said. “This is not a myth. Their intentions and abilities are being secretly collected.”