from the now-it's-Defense...Disturbed? dept.
Trump deal to share 3D-printed gun blueprints online ruled 'unlawful'
A federal judge has struck down a decision by the Trump administration to allow blueprints for 3D-printed guns to be shared online.
In a ruling published Tuesday, Judge Robert Lasnik said the deal made in July last year was "arbitrary and capricious" and thus a violation of the federal Administrative Procedure Act and the Constitution.
The original deal was part of a settlement between the Justice Department and Texas-based nonprofit Defense Distributed, which garnered worldwide attention in 2013 with its claims to have created the world's first "100 percent 3D-printed gun." The dissemination of plans for the gun was blocked by the Obama administration, but last year Defense Distributed successfully sued the government and had the ban reversed, arguing that it was a free speech violation.
[...] Bloomberg notes that the decision may still have limitations, given that Defense Distributed worked around a previous, temporary ban on downloading plans by simply mailing blueprints directly to customers. Said [spokesperson Chad] Flores: "The speech these states want so badly to censor is already on the internet and always will be."
Also at Bloomberg, NYT, and CBS.
Previously: Landmark Legal Shift for 3D-Printed Guns
[Updated] Defense Distributed Releasing Gun Plans, President Trump "Looking Into" It
Federal Judge Imposes Preliminary Injunction Against Defense Distributed's DEFCAD
Related Stories
For those in the US with a combined interest in 3D-Printers, intersections of the 1st and 2nd Amendments, and legal precedents; Cody Wilson has been fighting the US Government for half a decade.
Short version: after Wilson uploaded his 3D pistol plans to his site, over 100,000 people downloaded it - this drew the attention of the US authorities, who tried to use the International Trade in Arms Regulations (ITAR) to force a take-down.
The authorities argued that by posting the 3D printer plans for a firearm, Mr. Wilson was effectively exporting firearms, and subject to federal regulation. Eventually the Department of Justice dropped the case, paving the way for DIY'ers to publish such things freely.
The article cites 'promises' made by DoJ to move the regulations to another department.
Wired's article: A Landmark Legal Shift Opens Pandora's Box for DIY Guns (archive)
Related: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home
Japanese Gun Printer Goes to Jail
Suspected 3D-Printed Gun Parts and Plastic Knuckles Seized in Australia
FedEx Refuses to Ship Defense Distributed's Ghost Gunner CNC Mill
Man Who Used CNC Mill to Manufacture AR-15 "Lowers" Sentenced to 41 Months
Ghost Gunner Software Update Allows the Milling of an M1911 Handgun
Trump says public availability of 3D-printed guns 'doesn't seem to make much sense'
President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he is "looking into" the availability of plans for the 3D printing of guns, writing on Twitter that he had already been in touch with the NRA on the issue.
"I am looking into 3-D Plastic Guns being sold to the public. Already spoke to NRA, doesn't seem to make much sense!" the president wrote on Twitter Tuesday morning.
After a years-long legal battle, Defense Distributed, a Texas-based group, has announced plans to release instructions on Wednesday for guns that can be created by a 3-D printer, including a handgun and parts for a semi-automatic assault rifle. Although plans were not supposed to be available until Wednesday, instructions have already begun to appear online for download, CNN reported Tuesday.
Judge allows temporary ban on 3D-printed gun files to continue
A federal judge in Seattle has ruled against Defense Distributed, imposing a preliminary injunction requiring the company to keep its 3D-printed gun files offline for now.
US District Judge Robert Lasnik found in his Monday ruling that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed based on their argument that the Department of State, in allowing for a modification of federal export law, had unwittingly run afoul of a different law, the Administrative Procedure Act. In essence, the judge found that because the Department of State did not formally notify Congress when it modified the United States Munitions List, the previous legal settlement that Defense Distributed struck with the Department of State—which allowed publication of the files—is invalid.
As Ars has reported, Defense Distributed is the Texas-based company involved in a years-long lawsuit with the Department of State over publication of those files and making them available to foreigners. The company runs DEFCAD, perhaps the best-known online repository of gun files.
[...] Judge Lasnik's ruling today only briefly addressed the fact that the files are already available on numerous sites, including Github, The Pirate Bay, and more. These files have circulated online since their original publication back in 2013. (Recently, new mirrors of the files have begun to pop up.) "It is not clear how available the nine files are: the possibility that a cybernaut with a BitTorrent protocol will be able to find a file in the dark or remote recesses of the Internet does not make the posting to Defense Distributed's site harmless," he wrote.
Will legalnauts with gavels smack down this injunction?
Previously: Landmark Legal Shift for 3D-Printed Guns
[Updated] Defense Distributed Releasing Gun Plans, President Trump "Looking Into" It
Related: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home
FedEx Refuses to Ship Defense Distributed's Ghost Gunner CNC Mill
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Thursday November 14 2019, @12:24PM (11 children)
Gun control is one thing. That operates at the material level. But this censorship of mere plans-- even apart from the infringement on our freedoms, do authorities seriously expect that to be effective? Law enforcers are always pushing the boundaries on this stuff, and their zealousness has to be constantly checked.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @01:51PM (2 children)
Keep telling yourself that red neck nutbar.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @03:05PM
The sheer amount of evidence you provided and the eloquent rebuttal of the OP's statements have instantly converted me to your beliefs and way of thinking.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday November 16 2019, @06:46PM
in case you're not just trolling. go read the federalist papers and learn what the 2a is actually for and what arms The People are supposed to have.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by khallow on Thursday November 14 2019, @02:39PM (5 children)
Indeed.
(Score: 1, Troll) by exaeta on Thursday November 14 2019, @02:51PM (4 children)
The Government is a Bird
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @04:32PM (3 children)
Some parts of government are evil.
Maybe we should bring back "conservatives are literally nazis" if you want to play that dumb absolutist game.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday November 15 2019, @01:44AM (2 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 15 2019, @06:23AM (1 child)
In the "off-season" now, are we, khallow? Nothing to do, but foment Vienna Circle libertatianism until the snow melts and the passes open in the spring? Living off of socialist "unemployment insurance", are we? Unemployment from your "Deep State" contracting job? Q is on to you!!!
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday November 15 2019, @02:11PM
For what it's worth, I'm not, but I could be. One can collect unemployment insurance for being between seasonal employment.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Thursday November 14 2019, @05:34PM
I don't think so. I think it is a mixture of virtue signaling and working to overturn the 2A the hard way -- one person at a time.
A non-violent felony will cause a person to lose their gun rights for life.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday November 14 2019, @07:14PM
This should have been a slam dunk case but the Trump admin is such a bunch lying incompetents the judge was forced to throw it out.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @02:34PM (5 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @03:16PM (1 child)
They only have to put a few like you in jail for 20 years for that to stop.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @05:14PM
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Fnord666 on Thursday November 14 2019, @03:43PM (2 children)
I'm assuming there's a magnet link available somewhere for the files?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @04:24PM
Just search for "fosscad".
(Score: 4, Informative) by ncc74656 on Thursday November 14 2019, @06:03PM
They're still available through GitHub, surprisingly:
https://github.com/maduce/fosscad-repo [github.com]
You'll also find some other interesting stuff on LBRY:
https://open.lbry.com/@Deterrence-Dispensed [lbry.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @03:49PM (1 child)
I don't remember a federal judge from the opposing party being assigned to impede every aspect of the current government's policy in previous administrations.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 14 2019, @04:00PM
america is a communist country.
(Score: 2) by mobydisk on Thursday November 14 2019, @06:48PM (2 children)
Aren't the plans for actual guns readily available from the USPTO since they are patented? All patent filings are public domain. I thought that most guns sold today were based on famous designs by people like Samuel Colt and Mikhail Kalashnikov, and the patents have expired. Gun manufacturers take those open-source plans and make their own variations of them. Why would a plastic gun design be any different? Is there a process to "hide" a patent from the patent office web site? [uspto.gov]
(Score: 2) by Spook brat on Thursday November 14 2019, @08:10PM (1 child)
Most, yes. The Defense Distributed plans probably aren't. There's a remote chance of them being licensed creative commons something-or-other, but since Cody didn't plan to prevent others from building or selling them there would be no point in filing for a patent.
Also, if you look at the design files for the 3d-printed plastic gun Cody designed it's obvious that it's not a modification of a metal gun design. Working around the barrel/chamber size required to hold and fire the round forced lots of changes to the design of the rest of the gun. Patentable, yeah maybe; patented, probably not.
tl;dr: the way to hide an invention from the uspto is to never file an application.
Travel the galaxy! Meet fascinating life forms... And kill them [schlockmercenary.com]
(Score: 5, Interesting) by hemocyanin on Thursday November 14 2019, @08:53PM
The license for the DD files noted on defcad is GPL v3.0: https://github.com/DefiantCad/defcad-repo [github.com] That includes the original Liberator. I'm not easily finding what license Cody Wilson initially used, but given his anarchic views and his multiple public statements about "releasing them to the public domain(*)" -- the license is sure to be permissive in nature, although whether the files were donated to the copyright-public-domain space or not isn't clear to me.
(*) It's hard to tell if by "public domain" Wilson meant the copyright type, or the definition of public domain from ITAR: https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/cody-wilson-itar-state-department-liberator-supreme-court-gun-control/ [dailydot.com]
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Friday November 15 2019, @02:47AM
Wasn't this the gun that has a reasonable chance of blowing up in your hand? So an active mass shooter might off himself before the police even get there?