Yves Moreau

I am a concerned scientist doing research at the interface between artificial intelligence and genetics. I actively push back against the creeping development of mass surveillance technology, in particular the abusive deployment of forensic DNA databases. I am also engaged in a reflection on how technology shapes our society, and how to avoid that it further exacerbates inequalities or leads us to an ecological collapse. I encourage scientists and engineers to participate more actively in the social debate, beyond their strict expertise but in a rigorous and open-minded manner.

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Yves Moreau receives honorary doctorate from UCLouvain

I am immensely honored to have been awarded a doctorate honoris causa from UCLouvain, Belgium on February 27, 2025. Over the years, my efforts to push back against the misuse of forensic DNA technology have taken place through a network of collaborators. I would like them to feel that this recognition is shared with them! I have also been blessed to work with many fantastic journalists. I would like to dedicate this award to the hundreds of academics of Xinjiang who are arbitrarily detained, have disappeared, or have been unfairly sentenced, including Prof. Ilham Tohti, an economist at Central Minzu University, Sakharov Prize laureate, sentenced to life, and Prof. Rahile Dawut, an ethnographer at Xinjiang University, sentenced to life. Thank you to Sophie Richardson, Maya Wang, Emile Dirks, Ausma Bernot, PhD, Sui-Lee Wee, Mara Hvistendahl, and many more!
De Morgen •

Nieuwe generatie eugenetici uit radicaalrechtse hoek vindt ingang in onze universiteiten

Intussen is er zoveel vooruitgang in genetisch onderzoek dat sommigen daar gebruik van maken om opnieuw twijfel te zaaien over de verschillen tussen groepen, vertelt Moreau. [...] “Als zoiets wordt gepusht door superkrachtige influencers, dan moeten we daar als wetenschappers een antwoord op formuleren”, vindt Moreau, die er vrijdag zijn collega’s over aansprak op een bijeenkomst van de Belgian Society for Human Genetics. “Dat een filosoof zich over die vraagstukken buigt, is prima, maar zijn artikels worden versterkt tot ver buiten de academische wereld en gebruikt ter verantwoording van bepaalde denkbeelden.”
Chemical & Engineering News •

Journal retracts Thermo Fisher Scientific study after ethical concerns

“This study is particularly concerning because it is a technical milestone towards enabling a database at the scale of the entire population of China in a situation where basic fundamental rights of the Chinese population are not protected properly,” Moreau says. “Thermo Fisher has knowingly enabled the deployment of this technology on a massive scale by an authoritarian regime in the absence of elementary fundamental rights safeguards.” The John Wiley & Sons journal Electrophoresis published the original study in 2016. In...
Neues Deutschland •

"As researchers, we have a duty to intervene"

Geneticists map the knowledge they have gained, for example in relation to the prevalence of hereditary diseases. I feel that there is no awareness that this is dangerous because maps are political objects. When you start drawing precise maps, someone always starts drawing boundaries. If we want this research, we have to accept that we have a responsibility to society. If we see that the data is being instrumentalized in a very stigmatizing and discriminatory way, then we as scientists have a duty to intervene.
Forskerforum •

"Horrific research"

"Research ethics is not just about complying with the formalities of the law - it goes far beyond that. And when there are obviously so many ethical problems with these studies, it is an astonishing announcement. It feels as if the university has thought that now that the researcher with the most problematic connections to China's authorities is no longer associated with the university, the matter is over," he says, referring to the Chinese researcher who left his position as postdoc at Copenhagen's University in 2020.
DeWereldMorgen.be •

Wil Europa zijn onderzoek uitverkopen aan de wapenindustrie?

Maar een beweging naar morele onverschilligheid kan zich vlug voordoen. Als onderzoek met dubbel gebruik of militair onderzoek aanvaardbaar wordt in een immens onderzoeksprogramma zoals Horizon Europa, schept dat de indruk dat dit sociaal en moreel aanvaardbaar is. De morele verantwoordelijkheid voor de gevaren van een technologie wordt dan doorgeschoven naar diegenen die aan toepassingen werken. De onderzoekers worden zo van hun verantwoordelijkheid ontheven.
Le Soir •

Carta Academica – L’Europe veut-elle brader sa recherche à l’industrie de l’armement ?

On voit qu’on est face ici à une question essentielle pour l’Union européenne : un programme de recherche majeur exclusivement focalisé sur la recherche civile doit-il dans le futur servir en partie à soutenir le secteur de l’armement ? Une telle question nécessite un large débat public et démocratique. La Commission semble avoir déjà décidé à la place des citoyens européens et préférer ne pas s’encombrer d’un tel débat.
UK China Transparency •

BGI Genomics: a study and analysis of the company’s work in the UK

When it comes to BGI’s prenatal tests, Moreau says that some technical considerations are important, namely that: “when carried out as designed, they do not provide detailed or even clear information about the entire genome of the mother or the foetus.” However, given that BGI sends samples for testing in Hong Kong, the question for Moreau is whether a patient wants their DNA sample “to potentially end up somewhere in China, where it's really hard to control what happens with it?”
Khrono.no •

Allegations of ethics washing by publishers

Many of the big publishers take this too lightly. They make great speeches about ethical principles, but when violations of these rules are discovered, they want to sweep it under the rug. It is ethical laundering of the research, says Yves Moreau, professor of bioinformatics at the prestigious university KU Leuven in Belgium. For several years, Moreau has warned about unethical genetics research that deals with vulnerable groups in China. So far, 33 studies have been retracted as a result of his revelations, but it has been a struggle.
Khrono.no •

Professorens avsløringer har ført til 33 avpubliseringer

Brussel (Khrono.no): Professor i bioinformatikk Yves Moreau ved Universitetet KU Leuven i Belgia har varslet om totalt 102 studier han mener bryter de etiske retningslinjene for akademia. 33 studier er trukket, sju saker er lukket etter gjennomgang, og ytterligere 62 saker undersøkes fortsatt. 24 av disse artiklene er nå merket med «uttrykt bekymring» (expressions of concern) av forlagene.Mange av studiene har til felles at de er genetiske studier av utsatte minoritetsgrupper i Kina, blant annet...
Radio Free Asia •

Members of US congress raise concerns about American drug companies conducting clinical trials in Xinjiang

Professor Yves Moreau points out that conducting clinical trials in an area of ​​repression is not a trivial matter. Yves Moreau said: "The ethics of conducting any form of clinical trial in a repressed region is a question of quality, and it's not one that can be ignored. I believe that this is not a matter that the US Food and Drug Administration is considering urgently, but rather considering how to take action.
Center for Genetics and Society •

Precious DNA

Belgian professor of engineering Yves Moreau from the University of Leuven is a tireless critic of the unethical handling of DNA samples from Chinese minorities. In 2016 he became aware that DNA profiles were being created in Xinjiang as part of the regular passport registration process and offered his expertise to the Chinese branch of Human Rights Watch. Since then, he has been alerting editors of genetics journals to questionable articles and to the fact that ethics claims cannot be trusted when Chinese security agencies are involved in research. Moreau says scientific publishers should not accept papers if the collection of biometric data, including DNA and facial scans, is part of a system of repression.
Science et vie •

Expérimentations et éthique de la recherche : la Chine va-t-elle trop loin ?

De son côté, Yves Moreau, professeur de bio-informatique à la KU Leuven, en Belgique, s'inquiète des recherches menées en génétique médico-légale des populations. “En analysant 529 articles chinois publiés entre 2011 et 2018, j'ai constaté que 1 publication sur 5 concernait les Ouïgours, et 1 publication sur 6 les Tibétains, alors que ceux-ci ne représentent respectivement que 1 % et 0,5 % de la population chinoise.
Die Welt •

Datenschutz: So geraten sensible Patientendaten nicht in falschen Hände

Let's take a study in which citizens' position data collected from smartphones is made anonymously available to scientists by the network operator, for example to research traffic flows in cities. But even if this data is provided anonymously, it is quite easy to assign the data to specific people. I just have to look at where the cell phones are at night and most of the day. Then I know where a particular person lives and where he works. These are meaningful correlations. And then I also know that Mr. X occasionally visits his lover on the way home. There are often simple mechanisms with which information about specific people can be derived from seemingly anonymous data. In medical research, the connections cannot be described so clearly. But even there, there are traps lurking everywhere that you have to think about.
Mind Matters •

Dual-Use Technology and Research Ethics: Interview with Yves Moreau

The Uyghur people, as well as the Kazaks and other Turkic minorities in Xinjiang would be interesting to study from an ancestry and genetics perspective because they have lived for centuries at the crossroads of where the East meets the West along the famous Silk Road trading route. But where Chinese studies raise red flags is in the inordinate number of forensic genetics papers involving Uyghurs and Tibetans. Uyghurs makes up 1% of the Chinese population, yet Moreau said that out of 500 Chinese genetics research papers that his team looked at, 1-out-of-5 papers involved the genetic data of Uyghurs in some way. Additionally, among the papers that Moreau identified, most of the papers have a member of the Chinese public security bureau or some other law-enforcement entity as one of the co-authors.
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