AI heavyweights warn their tech could help terrorists develop bioweapons

ai and ml

Scientists and industry leaders push for mandatory DNA synthesis screening

The world’s AI luminaries love to warn us of impending planetary demise thanks to their creations, and they’re back with a new warning: Rapidly improving frontier AI models, combined with readily available synthetic nucleic acids, could lower barriers to biological weapons development.

The open letter, published this week, calls on lawmakers to make screening of orders for synthetic nucleic acids and the equipment used to produce them mandatory. It also backs recordkeeping for synthesis orders and sequence data so that potentially dangerous activity that slips through initial screening can be traced back to its source.

As has been the case with previous open letters from AI heavyweights warning of extinction-level threats from the products they created, the letter was signed by a who’s-who of the industry. Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis, OpenAI chief Sam Altman, Anthropic boss Dario Amodei, Microsoft AI leader Mustafa Suleyman, and other notable names appear on the letter. Outside the AI sector, leaders from the life sciences and nucleic acid synthesis industries also signed the letter, warning that advances in AI and the growing availability of synthetic nucleic acids could pose biosecurity risks.

“The ability to order synthetic DNA online has accelerated vaccine development, powered basic research, and made it possible for small teams to access capabilities that used to be confined to major institutions,” the signatories said, adding that synthetic nucleic acid availability has already been established to be a potential risk, and that advances in AI could increase those risks.

“AI systems are improving rapidly, and alongside incredible benefits to science and medicine, there is a real possibility that the knowledge barriers which have historically prevented bad actors from obtaining biological weapons will meaningfully erode,” the letter continued. 

Screening purchases of synthetic nucleic acids and the equipment to manufacture them, the letter argues, is one of the “best understood and least disruptive biosecurity measures available.” The signatories argue that providers of the equipment and materials should check synthesis requests for “sequences of concern,” and verify the legitimacy of a customer before shipping orders. Synthesis orders and sequence data should be retained as well, which would enable tracing of threats that evade initial screening.

“Awareness of traceability itself deters misuse,” the letter argues. “Many of the largest and most responsible providers in the industry already screen and record orders,” and they want those practices codified in US law.” 

“Given the pace at which the underlying technology is changing, we believe the need is urgent,” the letter concludes. “Congress should act this session … this is a rare moment of agreement across stakeholders that are often at odds. We hope policymakers will meet it with decisive action.”

There are currently a couple of bills in Congress aimed at strengthening oversight of synthetic nucleic acid synthesis: one introduced in the House more than a year ago, and another filed in the Senate in January 2026. The House measure was ordered reported out of committee in April 2025 but has seen no further action, while the Senate bill has remained in committee since its introduction.

It’s worth noting that the Biden administration’s Office of Science and Technology Policy published a framework in April 2024 directing federally funded life sciences research to procure synthetic nucleic acids and synthesis equipment from providers that follow specified screening practices. The Trump administration ordered OSTP to revise or replace that framework in a May 2025 executive order, giving the office 90 days to do so.

A new version of the framework has yet to be published. ®