NRA-ILA | We Can Relate: Digital Culture Rues Targeting of Neutral Technology, Innocent Users

The rapid expansion of regulations targeting 3D printed firearms is increasingly raising justifiable concerns apart from the Second Amendment community. As lawmakers venture beyond tradition gun control efforts into the realm of limiting digital code and hardware functionality, the collateral impact on others, including across various facets of computer culture, is obviously being felt. Case in point: World of Software’s April 7 article: Lawmakers want to restrict 3D printing to stop ghost guns. Critics say it won’t work, which notes, “the discomfort reaches beyond the right to bear arms.”

Welcome to the world of gun control and constitutional collateral damage.

As courts grapple with both Second and First Amendment challenges to 3D printing regulations, it was only a matter of time before a gun control rooted cause began collecting additional dissenters along the way. That time is now for computer programmers who write and share code as a form of technical expression and professional development. Computer engineers are awakening to the fact that proposals to require built-in blocking and surveillance software could fundamentally alter the general purpose of 3D printers, limiting legitimate uses far beyond firearms.

As state legislatures explore measures beyond regulating or outright banning 3D printed firearms, the attacks extend to criminalizing digital files and the sharing or distribution of these files; mandating filtering, blocking, and reporting firmware to be incorporated into general purpose 3D printers; and penalizing software platforms for hosting content. As we have mentioned previously, these efforts recall Renaissance era campaigns to clamp down on emerging technology like printing presses and related equipment, lest heresy, sedition, and political dissent take hold.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a digital rights group, told World of Software it is “wishful thinking” such regulations would deter people from printing firearms or their parts, opining they would instead complicate law-abiding users’ embrace of a developing technology. In other words, gun controllers are diverting attention and resources from more direct drivers of violence, making real world impact on safety for citizens essentially zero, while creating substantial barriers and aggravation for those same citizens in the pursuit of innocent and beneficial activity.

While some states have varying forms of prohibitions or regulations on 3D printed firearms, federal law allows for individuals to make firearms, by whatever means, for personal use without a license, as long as the person is not prohibited from possession of firearms, the firearm is detectable, and the firearm is not made or sold for profit. Firearms and related items that are illegal under federal and/or state law are still illegal. Items that are already regulated by federal and/or state law are still regulated

For now, only a small number of states like California, New Jersey, Delaware, and most recently Washington State explicitly target the distribution of 3D printed firearm files or code with varying approaches that employ both criminal bans and civil liability. Authoritarian legislatures in other states are actively pursuing similar infringements, aided and cheered on by gun control activists.

NRA-ILA has been warning of the burgeoning assault on 3D printed firearms and computer code (see, for example, Everytown’s 3D Printed Firearm Panic Summit, New York’s Latest Efforts to Ban 3D Blueprints, Information Warfare: New Lawsuit Targets Distribution of Gun Making Computer Files). As states widen the net on this technology, opposition voices are likely to increase.

May those voices only get louder and more numerous in underscoring the practical and legal flaws in these sweeping restrictions. Overreaching regulation is nothing new to the Second Amendment community, but the expansion of government into core areas of multi-purpose technology is poised to set new and difficult precedents in regulating the digital ecosystem. The threat to chill innovation; stymie research; halt collaboration; and criminalize lawful and constitutionally protected conduct will continue spreading to communities in the innovation and maker spaces. Indeed, diverse fields including sports, medicine, manufacturing, and the arts all use these emerging technologies to create prototypes, spare parts, and other products that are advancing the state of the art.

Opposing overreach now is far easier than trying to unwind it later, with failure to act sure to leave lasting consequences that extend well beyond the original issue. Ultimately, all citizens in any interest group should be concerned when restrictive laws are introduced that could squelch innovation and stretch government censorship into areas of expression, free speech, research and development, and the American traditions of tinkering and invention.