The Dark Side of DNA Editing
Hacking the Code
The Dark Side of DNA Editing
"Criminals could manipulate their own DNA to avoid detection on police databases," experts warned recently.1 The proposed tool is a do-it-yourself gene editing kit that can be purchased online for less than $150. The technique is CRISPR, a breakthrough "molecular scalpel" method that enables researchers to identify an undesirable DNA segment and replace it with a corrected version. Originally intended to eliminate fatal human diseases and improve agricultural production, the relative ease and increasing accuracy of CRISPR make it a tempting tool for many, including bad actors.
The basic idea is to edit enough of one's own DNA to distinguish it from DNA left at a crime scene or stored in any criminal database. Professor George Church of Harvard, a CRISPR researcher, admitted that criminals could use the technique to vanish from a criminal database.2 With DNA as the current gold standard of criminal evidence, prosecutors would have a tough time proving that the pre-CRISPR person and the post-edited individual were the same person. CRISPR editing does not leave a detectable trace.
The do-it-yourself kit is simple enough to be used by high-school science students. But according to Josiah Zayner, its developer, it does not work in human beings.3 Zayner, who has a Ph.D. in biophysics from the University of Chicago and spent two years at NASA working on designs for a colony on Mars, did his own form of self-editing, a microbiome transplant, which was recorded in a documentary. He later injected his arm with DNA coding for CRISPR, a stunt he live-streamed and subsequently regretted.4
The Democratization of Science
An outspoken advocate for the democratization of science, Zayner's goal in making scientific breakthroughs more widely available is to accelerate the accessibility of cures, which often take decades to roll out, but not to avoid basic research. Tristan Roberts, a fellow biohacker, imitated Zayner's stunt, but without a solid research basis. Roberts injected himself with a gene therapy to treat HIV in 2010, and Aaron Traywick, another biohacker, performed a similar live stunt with a herpes vaccine in February 2018.5 Traywick died in April.6 Do-it-yourself gene therapy has limits; it cannot surmount the ineradicable realities of nature and the way the human body functions. Gene therapies, vaccine concoctions, and CRISPR editing are not playthings but life-altering technologies with potentially life-ending outcomes.
Criminal Evasion—or Even Worse
How realistic is the idea of self-editing to avoid criminal detection? Dr. Alexander Gray of the Leverhulme Research Centre at the University of Dundee in Scotland thinks it would be very difficult to edit enough DNA segments to create a distinct DNA fingerprint.7 Church disagrees, but for different reasons. People already undergo a significant amount of DNA change through blood transfusions, he says, "and even if you just get a stem cell transplant you have a new identity."8 A bone marrow transplant turns the recipient into a chimera, since although he retains his own DNA, he also has the donor's cells with their DNA circulating in his blood. Depending on which cells are tested, the recipient's DNA could be identified as his own or as the donor's.9
While the specter of arch criminals self-editing their DNA is worrisome, it is also hypothetical at this point. Of greater concern is the weaponization of CRISPR technology. In 2016, James Clapper, then the Director of National Intelligence, warned the national security and biotechnology community that gene editing is a global danger, and could introduce "potentially harmful biological agents or products" into populations.10 He ranked it with other global threats such as North Korea's nuclear weapons, Syria's chemical weapons, and Russia's cruise missiles.11 The security threat, he asserted, is wide-ranging:
Armed with the proper genetic sequences, states or bioterrorists could employ genome editing to create highly virulent pathogens for use in such attacks [to infect hundreds of thousands of people with lethal diseases]. They could, for example, change a less dangerous, non-pathogenic strain of anthrax into a highly virulent form by altering the genome, or recreate pathogens such as the deadly smallpox virus, which was eradicated in the wild in 1980. Or they could develop specific weapons that target either individuals or even entire races: With the right manipulations, a pathogen could be made to have greater invasiveness or virulence in a target population.12
A bioterrorist could alter a virus via CRISPR and then use the altered virus to attack an enemy nation's food supply. Radical bioterrorists might not hesitate to unleash a deadly disease, even at the risk of their own group's survival. And access to the potentially destructive technology is easier than ever to obtain.
Accidents Can Happen
Although gene editing technologies were developed years ago, CRISPR brought down the price ($5,000 vs. $30 per order) and scaled up the accessibility, precision, and ease of use.13 Ethics oversight and the structures of research institutions mitigate the risk of organized experiments going awry, particularly when human subjects are involved. But unsupervised or amateur biohackers, citizen scientists, and scofflaws with criminal intentions evade those protections. They are all vulnerable to a significant risk: accidental misuse. An altered virus could escape from the lab, or a genetic modification (via gene drive technology) intended to alter only a local species or population could spread, eradicating an entire species, with unknown ecological consequences.
International Regulatory Oversight & Limitations
Meanwhile, both American and international scientific and governmental regulatory bodies are debating how to limit the damage that could be done by bad actors and unsupervised amateurs. Plant and animal geneticists do not want to slow down beneficial research. Others want to distinguish CRISPR from GMO modification of plants and animals, which is broadly opposed in Europe. That is not to say that nothing can be done, but whether something will be done often depends on whether or not there has been a catastrophe.
The good news is that apprehension about negative consequences is widely felt. The potential for establishing shared global standards and enforcement procedures exists. The bad news is that it may take a catastrophe such as an escaped virus or the release of a bioterrorist's pathogen to prompt a global response. This is a decidedly darker scenario than a hypothetical isolated criminal escaping detection thanks to a CRISPR "cloak of deception."
Paige Comstock Cunninghamis the Executive Director of The Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity in Deerfield, Illinois.
Get Salvo in your inbox! This article originally appeared in Salvo, Issue #46, Fall 2018 Copyright © 2026 Salvo | www.salvomag.com https://salvomag.com/article/salvo46/hacking-the-code
