Thankfully “smart” guns are not ever likely to make it to the market, despite what a large swath of anti-2A people believe.
I can’t even get the fingerprint reader on my phone to work consistently; why would I want to put something like that on a firearm when my life could be at risk if my gun doesn’t work correctly?
Soldiers have nanomachines (in Metal Gear nanomachines can be replaced with magic) in them that work like ID tags and guns only work when they detect it
So… Magic? I mean, sure, if we had perfect magic that knew who could and could not be trusted to use your gun, fine. In a practical sense, all you need to prevent other people from using your guns is a lock. I put a lock on my closet. If the aren’t under my supervision, they’re behind at least one lock.
You have This., and This. Like everything, it seems like it’s mostly just a political issue. You’d probably get more gas out of a smart holster, honestly, but there’s just not very much demand from the people who buy guns for actual safety measures, including police departments and militaries. The closest I think you’ll find that gun owners commonly want is access to suppressors, mostly out of the convenience of not having to wear hearing protection, and also maybe that it makes them feel like a cool epic black ops guy.
They simply aren’t reliable in the kind of situations where you’re likely to need a firearm though. As I said in another comment, I would want a smart gun to be at least as reliable as a 1911, and–to be very clear–a 1911 is not what I would call a reliable firearm.
I have constant problems with the fingerprint scanner on my phone. If my hands are too dry, no dice. Even slightly wet, nope. Bad day? Yeah, I’m going to have to enter my passphrase. And what if I need to shoot off-hand? Facial recognition? Cameras have a hard time with black and Asian people already, but now my life might depend on a camera getting it right the first time? And might depend on it in bad lighting?
This isn’t something I would ever seriously consider.
IMO, if you want-or need–to keep a loaded gun near you while you sleep, just leave it unlocked, and then either lock it in a real security container, or keep it on your person when you aren’t in your bedroom.
BTW - I generally avoid anything with Ian McCollum, since he’s been pretty clear that he doesn’t support 2A rights for everyone (e.g., the poors, LGBTQ+ people, non-white people, etc.), and has generally been acting like a right-wing grifter. Which is unfortunate.
Yeah, there’s not really a great solution that’s going to be reliable and also be fast. The best case scenario I can think of for a smart gun is maybe a car gun, or something that people might otherwise have kept in a safe, but gun safes and locks aren’t really expensive enough to justify these kinds of purchases, and obviously they’re going to be more reliable than any digital security you might wanna go for. These sorts of things are also somewhat spoofable, even just with modification to the gun, so I don’t really think smart gun systems would really help cut down on gun trafficking, either. At least, not with any actually feasible, normal solution.
BTW - I generally avoid anything with Ian McCollum, since he’s been pretty clear that he doesn’t support 2A rights for everyone (e.g., the poors, LGBTQ+ people, non-white people, etc.), and has generally been acting like a right-wing grifter. Which is unfortunate.
Yeah I saw the whole uhh, brownells thing that happened between him and inrangeTV, and that kinda sucked, plus the azov battalion book which seemed like pure grift. Also the HEAT rig collab he released sucked. I dunno that I’d call him a right wing grifter too much on that front, as much as just, a pure grifter, which is maybe right wing depending on how you’re judging your personal overton window. I don’t really think whatever his political beliefs are tend to infect his actual content much, if at all. It does kinda suck, though, just generally. Luckily I have adblock so I don’t really have to be supporting his grift while I learn about cool historical stuff, and he’s a pretty good resource with his disassemblies of obscure stuff. Overall, he sucks more than I like.
but gun safes and locks aren’t really expensive enough to justify these kinds of purchases
This is the only thing I disagree with you on. A good gun safe and lock is incredibly expensive. Anything that’s actually burglary rated is going to start at about $5k and go up from there. Good locks, like an S&G mechanical combination lock, can be had for a couple hundred bucks. (And by ‘good’, I mean the ones that the DoD uses for high-security; it would take an autodialer about a day, on average, to open one.) ‘Good enough’ safes are not too bad though, since they’re mostly acting as a deterrent. E.g., little Timmy probably isn’t going to spend a couple hours trying every possible combination until he finds the right one, and he’s probably not going to take a pry bar to it.
Deviant Olam has a few videos up on gun safes, and also has a video of him showing what it takes to break into a DoD-approved safe (…that he was getting paid to break into). IIRC the general rule of thumb is that a gun safe should be 15-25% of the replacement value of your guns. If you only have one or two, whatever meets your state’s requirement–if your state has a mandate about locking guns up–is fine. If you’ve got $10,000 in firearms–which is scarily easy to do–then you probably want to spend about $2000 or so on a residential security container. If you have a single legal machine gun, you’re probably going to want to invest in a safe that’s upwards of $10k.
I sincerely hope that they can find a way to make these work and be as reliable as a Glock. Not necessarily because they can’t be spoofed, trafficked, etc., but because it would significantly cut down on accidents, and it would also make it much less likely that your own gun could be used against you.
I really want them, from a tech stand point, to be a thing, but no doubt on the reliability issue.
The better design I’ve see is something like RFID in the hands that reads on the grip of the gun. Biometrics are not a good idea for any system that needs that level of reliableility.
The other thing is I would want it to a trigger well replacement not a constant check (I.e. once unlocked it stays unlocked untill deliberately locked again).
Even an RFID reader would be a bad thing, IMO. First and foremost, you have the issue of battery life; most people fail to check the batteries in their smoke detectors regularly, so I can’t imagine people would remember to check the reader in their firearm. Secondly, given that many people that have guns have multiple guns, you would need some kind of sending unit–assuming that the firearm would be the reader, since the reader is going to be larger–that is either universal, or can be programmed and paired to multiple devices. Either one of those would still allow unauthorized users to steal your gun. Especially if they had something like a Flipper Zero that could read and modify RFID data.
Adding on to this, you may have to shoot with your off hand, or in a position where the reader isn’t close enough to detect the chip; then you have a no-shoot situation, which could potentially be deadly.
I had to scan my credit card three times at the grocery store yesterday; the reader couldn’t read my card. Now imagine that when someone is trying to carjack you.
I would want smart guns to be at least as reliable as a 1911–which is not a reliable firearm–before I would go for them.
I don’t think I would trust it in a reactive shoot circumstance either to be honest. I’m also not too worried about a pretty advanced cyber threat of someone both actvily attacking an RFID chip (a programable definetly adds added complexity factor to me too) and getting my firearm. Its more so if someone broke into my house and took my firearm they would have added difficulty using it or if someone is in my house, kids, guests, etc and they get ahold of it there is one added layer of safety.
People generally won’t accept implants for things like that. Supposedly Biofire has a pretty reliable smart gun coming out any time now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cRm9BMxl90
Remember: Always replace EagleOS on your SmartGun with Linux to avoid the NRA’s telemetry.
Thankfully “smart” guns are not ever likely to make it to the market, despite what a large swath of anti-2A people believe.
I can’t even get the fingerprint reader on my phone to work consistently; why would I want to put something like that on a firearm when my life could be at risk if my gun doesn’t work correctly?
What if they work like in MGS4
How do those guns work? I haven’t played the game.
Soldiers have nanomachines (in Metal Gear nanomachines can be replaced with magic) in them that work like ID tags and guns only work when they detect it
So… Magic? I mean, sure, if we had perfect magic that knew who could and could not be trusted to use your gun, fine. In a practical sense, all you need to prevent other people from using your guns is a lock. I put a lock on my closet. If the aren’t under my supervision, they’re behind at least one lock.
RFID implants are a thing in humans
Then they would be hackable for unauthorized use with the right nanomachines, son
Geez no spoilers
Haven’t played that one, so I don’t know which on it is.
Smart guns in Cyberpunk seems interesting, but I don’t think that most anti-gun people would be that happy about Skippy being real.
People have definitely tried.
You have This., and This. Like everything, it seems like it’s mostly just a political issue. You’d probably get more gas out of a smart holster, honestly, but there’s just not very much demand from the people who buy guns for actual safety measures, including police departments and militaries. The closest I think you’ll find that gun owners commonly want is access to suppressors, mostly out of the convenience of not having to wear hearing protection, and also maybe that it makes them feel like a cool epic black ops guy.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
This.
This.
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
They simply aren’t reliable in the kind of situations where you’re likely to need a firearm though. As I said in another comment, I would want a smart gun to be at least as reliable as a 1911, and–to be very clear–a 1911 is not what I would call a reliable firearm.
I have constant problems with the fingerprint scanner on my phone. If my hands are too dry, no dice. Even slightly wet, nope. Bad day? Yeah, I’m going to have to enter my passphrase. And what if I need to shoot off-hand? Facial recognition? Cameras have a hard time with black and Asian people already, but now my life might depend on a camera getting it right the first time? And might depend on it in bad lighting?
This isn’t something I would ever seriously consider.
IMO, if you want-or need–to keep a loaded gun near you while you sleep, just leave it unlocked, and then either lock it in a real security container, or keep it on your person when you aren’t in your bedroom.
BTW - I generally avoid anything with Ian McCollum, since he’s been pretty clear that he doesn’t support 2A rights for everyone (e.g., the poors, LGBTQ+ people, non-white people, etc.), and has generally been acting like a right-wing grifter. Which is unfortunate.
Yeah, there’s not really a great solution that’s going to be reliable and also be fast. The best case scenario I can think of for a smart gun is maybe a car gun, or something that people might otherwise have kept in a safe, but gun safes and locks aren’t really expensive enough to justify these kinds of purchases, and obviously they’re going to be more reliable than any digital security you might wanna go for. These sorts of things are also somewhat spoofable, even just with modification to the gun, so I don’t really think smart gun systems would really help cut down on gun trafficking, either. At least, not with any actually feasible, normal solution.
Yeah I saw the whole uhh, brownells thing that happened between him and inrangeTV, and that kinda sucked, plus the azov battalion book which seemed like pure grift. Also the HEAT rig collab he released sucked. I dunno that I’d call him a right wing grifter too much on that front, as much as just, a pure grifter, which is maybe right wing depending on how you’re judging your personal overton window. I don’t really think whatever his political beliefs are tend to infect his actual content much, if at all. It does kinda suck, though, just generally. Luckily I have adblock so I don’t really have to be supporting his grift while I learn about cool historical stuff, and he’s a pretty good resource with his disassemblies of obscure stuff. Overall, he sucks more than I like.
This is the only thing I disagree with you on. A good gun safe and lock is incredibly expensive. Anything that’s actually burglary rated is going to start at about $5k and go up from there. Good locks, like an S&G mechanical combination lock, can be had for a couple hundred bucks. (And by ‘good’, I mean the ones that the DoD uses for high-security; it would take an autodialer about a day, on average, to open one.) ‘Good enough’ safes are not too bad though, since they’re mostly acting as a deterrent. E.g., little Timmy probably isn’t going to spend a couple hours trying every possible combination until he finds the right one, and he’s probably not going to take a pry bar to it.
Deviant Olam has a few videos up on gun safes, and also has a video of him showing what it takes to break into a DoD-approved safe (…that he was getting paid to break into). IIRC the general rule of thumb is that a gun safe should be 15-25% of the replacement value of your guns. If you only have one or two, whatever meets your state’s requirement–if your state has a mandate about locking guns up–is fine. If you’ve got $10,000 in firearms–which is scarily easy to do–then you probably want to spend about $2000 or so on a residential security container. If you have a single legal machine gun, you’re probably going to want to invest in a safe that’s upwards of $10k.
I sincerely hope that they can find a way to make these work and be as reliable as a Glock. Not necessarily because they can’t be spoofed, trafficked, etc., but because it would significantly cut down on accidents, and it would also make it much less likely that your own gun could be used against you.
I really want them, from a tech stand point, to be a thing, but no doubt on the reliability issue.
The better design I’ve see is something like RFID in the hands that reads on the grip of the gun. Biometrics are not a good idea for any system that needs that level of reliableility. The other thing is I would want it to a trigger well replacement not a constant check (I.e. once unlocked it stays unlocked untill deliberately locked again).
Even an RFID reader would be a bad thing, IMO. First and foremost, you have the issue of battery life; most people fail to check the batteries in their smoke detectors regularly, so I can’t imagine people would remember to check the reader in their firearm. Secondly, given that many people that have guns have multiple guns, you would need some kind of sending unit–assuming that the firearm would be the reader, since the reader is going to be larger–that is either universal, or can be programmed and paired to multiple devices. Either one of those would still allow unauthorized users to steal your gun. Especially if they had something like a Flipper Zero that could read and modify RFID data.
Adding on to this, you may have to shoot with your off hand, or in a position where the reader isn’t close enough to detect the chip; then you have a no-shoot situation, which could potentially be deadly.
I had to scan my credit card three times at the grocery store yesterday; the reader couldn’t read my card. Now imagine that when someone is trying to carjack you.
I would want smart guns to be at least as reliable as a 1911–which is not a reliable firearm–before I would go for them.
I don’t think I would trust it in a reactive shoot circumstance either to be honest. I’m also not too worried about a pretty advanced cyber threat of someone both actvily attacking an RFID chip (a programable definetly adds added complexity factor to me too) and getting my firearm. Its more so if someone broke into my house and took my firearm they would have added difficulty using it or if someone is in my house, kids, guests, etc and they get ahold of it there is one added layer of safety.
People generally won’t accept implants for things like that. Supposedly Biofire has a pretty reliable smart gun coming out any time now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cRm9BMxl90
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://www.piped.video/watch?v=2cRm9BMxl90
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
I’ve been following them! It’ll be interesting for sure to see what comes out.
They are popular in the biohacker community with one girl I know with like a dozen sheusees for street magic.
If you can get them added and removed at home its less scary I think.