Challenges of automation and scale: Bioinformatics and the evaluation of proteins to support genetically modified product safety assessments

•Bioinformatic methods are being increasingly used in the development and commercialization phases of genetically modified products.•The amount of publicly available bioinformatic data is growing at an incredible rate.•Not all bioinformatic data is handled in a standard way which can lead to some unintended consequences, especially in the case of genetically modified crop discovery and regulation.•Although bioinformatics and bioinformatic data provide a wealth of information that can be processed an analyzed, it is important to recognize that the data is not without limitations and can’t always be taken at face value.