Smart guns, which only respond to previously identified people, could come to market this year in the United States, where lawmakers are deadlocked on gun regulation.
The interest of integrating electronic chips in certain weapons, and the reliability of these, has been the subject of debate for years. The goal is to prevent children, criminals and suicides from pulling the trigger.
However, at this time there is no evidence that supporters of armed self-defense are ready to embrace them, or that these so-called “smart” pistols work as well as promised.
“I don’t have a crystal ball as to whether they will be mostly positive, mostly negative, or ultimately have the same flaw as other smart weapons in the past,” says Adam Skaggs, legal counsel for Giffords, a firearms regulatory association.
The company SmartGunz has used RFID (radio frequency identification) chips, such as those used in electronic toll cards, for example. The user must wear a connected ring in order to fire.
Its director, Tom Holland, speaks to police officers worried that an arrested person is pointing their gun at them, or parents worried that their children will find theirs.
“People who want a ‘safer’ weapon can choose, if they feel they need lethal protection at home,” he explains.
His products are already being tested by law enforcement units across the country and he hopes to market them to the public in the spring.
– By fingerprint –
About 40% of American adults live in a home where there are guns, according to the Pew Research Center.
Nearly 23 million units were sold in 2020, a record, according to Small Arms Analytics & Forecasting, which expects 20 million by 2021.
The pandemic and protests against racial discrimination contributed to a sharp rise in homicides in 2020, although levels remained below 1990s peaks.
While American tragedies in schools or public places often make headlines, more than half of the 40,000 gun deaths each year are suicides.
Ginger Chandler, co-founder of manufacturer LodeStar Works, sees authentication systems as a physical but also a psychological barrier to incidents.
“In a moment of stress, the authorized person takes the gun but there will be this extra step,” he says. “Maybe it gives them time to think, ‘Do I really want to do this?'”
His company plans to market a 9mm in 2023 that can be activated through a mobile application or directly with a secret code or through biometric fingerprint recognition.
– More “smart” but still deadly –
Companies probably won’t be able to count on legislators to approve this new equipment. The issue divides voters to the point of preventing any evolution of the laws.
In 2000, the US manufacturer Smith & Wesson and the Bill Clinton administration had agreed that smart guns would be part of reforms to reduce violence, but the project failed in the face of opposition from the powerful gun lobby.
Similarly, in 2002, a law in the state of New Jersey, which would have banned handguns without authentication mechanisms, caused outrage. It was transformed in 2019 into a simple obligation for state armories to sell these new generation weapons when they are marketed.
The episode of the failure of the German manufacturer Armatix did not help this technology either: in 2017 a hacker circumvented its identification system with magnets.
Beyond the antecedents, the concept is not unanimous even among those in favor of the regulation of firearms. Because smart or not, these weapons are still deadly.
In addition, “few owners or families at risk will buy these more expensive pistols than others. They will especially appeal to those who already care about safety,” says Daniel Webster, a researcher specializing in the subject at Johns Hopkins University.
Gareth Glaser, co-founder of LodeStar, does not want to get into political debates: “We prefer that the government does not get involved and that the consumer chooses.”
