BIS Completes Interagency Review for Export Control Rule Over Biological Equipment Software

The Bureau of Industry and Security this week completed an interagency review for a final rule that would expand export controls on certain biological equipment software. The rule, received by the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs Sept. 13 (see 2109140011) and completed Sept. 28, would control software “for the operation of automated nucleic acid assemblers and synthesizers” that are “capable of designing and building functional genetic elements from digital sequence data.”

BIS previously issued the rule in proposed form in November and requested comments (see 2011050043). The control would be part of BIS’s emerging and foundational technology control effort, the agency said, and would seek to restrict exports of software that can be used to produce pathogens and toxins for biological weapons.