A recent report suggests that American intelligence officials are worried that a company based in Abu Dhabi might provide China with the genetic data of U.S. citizens.
As per The New York Times, two officials familiar with intelligence reports cautioned that the Abu Dhabi-based technology firm G42, which does business with Chinese companies, could potentially allow the Chinese government to obtain the genetic information of millions of Americans and also gain access to advanced U.S. technology.
The New York Times revealed that G42 has made numerous investments, including a genome-sequencing venture, a $10 billion investment fund in technology, and an Arabic artificial intelligence platform.
According to Bloomberg, the company has bought over $100 million in ByteDance shares, the parent company of TikTok based in Beijing. Additionally, The Daily Caller mentioned that ByteDance has a Chinese Communist Party committee. Forbes reported that employees of ByteDance used information gathered on TikTok to track American journalists reporting on the app last year.
Per The Daily Caller, the CIA developed a classified profile of Peng Xiao, the CEO of G42. Intelligence officials informed The New York Times that Xiao received education in the United States before renouncing his citizenship to become a citizen of the United Arab Emirates.
The New York Times also stated that Xiao previously supervised Pax AI, a company in the United Arab Emirates that managed a social media platform called ToTok. U.S. intelligence agencies flagged the ToTok social media platform as a surveillance service for the United Arab Emirates, which was utilized to monitor the discussions and movements of social media users.
The New York Times mentioned that Xiao had a previous project in 2017 called Pegasus, which collaborated with Huawei, a Chinese technology company, to develop surveillance technology for law enforcement organizations. The outlet added that intelligence agencies had scrutinized the G42 subsidiary, Presight AI, which sells surveillance technology to law enforcement agencies worldwide, using software akin to the software used by Chinese police.
“G42 has collaborated with various international technology players from around the world,” shared Talal Al Kaissi, a senior executive, with the NYT. Kaissi highlighted the company’s discussions with Microsoft in 2022 and potential partnerships with Cerebras and Nvidia in the U.S.
As per an October press release, G42 has formed a partnership with OpenAI, the company behind the artificial intelligence platform known as ChatGPT.
“Leveraging G42’s industry expertise, we aim to empower businesses and communities with effective solutions that resonate with the nuances of the region,” wrote OpenAI CEO Sam Altman in the press release. “This collaboration lays the foundation for equitable advancements in generative AI across the globe.”