Macron refused Russian Covid test in Putin trip over DNA theft fears – sources | Hacker News Reader

Macron refused Russian Covid test in Putin trip over DNA theft fears – sources

reuters.com

3 pointspseudolus9 comments

I would assume all secret services have DNA from all the world leaders. It can't be that hard to prepare a glass someone drinks from, or a hand shake, or find a lost hair on the carpet.

What if the probe contained a slow-acting poison and he would drop dead of unknown causes in 3 weeks?

I see why he wouldn't want that, but what Russia / anyone do with DNA? Someone please educate me here...

He doesn't want to be cloned, which basically sounds like a sci-fi movie plot where he gets replaced with a flash clone. He's probably being more paranoid than necessary and looks more foolish than necessary for someone who is in charge of a country.

There are other more realistic concerns like surveillance by DNA sampling and framing by DNA planting. Genetically specific poison could be also possibility.

What's a genetically specific poison?

A poison that only works against a person with specific genes. Hopefully still science fiction today but probably feasible in near future.

We know today that DNA can be extracted from air.

https://www.livescience.com/dna-collected-air.html

In addition there are probably more valid reasons for heads of state not to have DNA available to a possible future adversary. A more reasonable fear would be these two from

https://internethealthreport.org/2019/23-reasons-not-to-reve... and many others:

+You may be discriminated against in the future. In the United States, health insurers and workplaces are not allowed to discriminate based on DNA. But the law does not apply to life insurance or disability insurance. Who knows in your case, where you live? Some day you could be compelled to share genetic information with your own insurer.

+Racists are weaponizing the results. White nationalists have flocked to commercial DNA companies to vie for the highest race-purity points on extremist websites.

And here we pay 29.99 to send off our dna to get our DNA sequenced.

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