China has been working on building the world's largest genetic database as Chinese police gather blood samples from around 700 million males, including children, all over the country.
According to new research, police have been doing rounds in communities and even schools to draw blood samples as the Chinese government aims to create a national DNA database. It has been reported that the government has been compiling genetic information since 2017.
However, in 2019, the biotech giant reportedly stopped selling the DNA testing kits to the Xinjiang region, where the authorities have been persecuting the local Muslim population for years.
Authorities have been surveying the Uighur minority, a Turkic group, who lives in the oil-rich region. Surveillance cameras are installed everywhere, and spyware is installed on people's smartphones.
Privacy and abuse concerns over the DNA project
However, the project raised concerns about privacy and abuse from some officials in China and human rights advocates within and outside the country, particularly as the government forces everyone to submit their genetic codes.
Rights activists warned that the national DNA database could invade the people's privacy rights since the collection is done without consent since citizens do not have the right to refuse if they are in an authoritarian state. Activists are also worried that officials may punish the family of activists and dissenters.
Human Rights Watch researcher Maya Wang told the NYT that this database allows the authorities to locate "who is most intimately related to whom" and may lead to having the entire families by punished because of an individual's activism. Wang added that there will be "a chilling effect on society as a whole."
Read also: China Launches 'Clean Plate' Campaign to Clamp Down Mukbang; YouTubers Have Undeclared Ads?
This article is owned by Tech Times
Written by: CJ Robles
