The question of regulation is a particularly poignant one for synthetic biology. All actors agree that the science should prepare against problems of safety and security, on large and small scales. Some forms of regulation are already established in multiple ways. For example, the National Institute of Health regulates some access to different organisms with their biosafety level system. However, other areas of research to be regulated are much less clear cut, as scientists expand the bounds of scientific inquiry. Our knowledge of biology is as of yet very limited, and as engineering principles and methods of standardization are applied to biology, products of synthetic biology will come into contact with biological systems in ways we cannot predict. Thus, as we search for a method to regulate the engineering field, whose body of information will continue to grow for many decades to come, we come against the challenge of preparedness.