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Federal Judge Imposes Preliminary Injunction Against Defense Distributed's DEFCAD
Judge allows temporary ban on 3D-printed gun files to continue [arstechnica.com]
A federal judge in Seattle has ruled [documentcloud.org] against Defense Distributed, imposing a preliminary injunction requiring the company to keep its 3D-printed gun files [arstechnica.com] 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 [wikipedia.org]. 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 [defcad.com], 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 [github.com], The Pirate Bay [thepiratebay.org], and more. These files have circulated online since their original publication back in 2013. (Recently, new mirrors [codeisfreespeech.com] 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 [documentcloud.org].
Will legalnauts with gavels smack down this injunction?
Cody Wilson [wikipedia.org].
Previously: Landmark Legal Shift for 3D-Printed Guns [soylentnews.org]
[Updated] Defense Distributed Releasing Gun Plans, President Trump "Looking Into" It [soylentnews.org]
Related: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home [soylentnews.org]
FedEx Refuses to Ship Defense Distributed's Ghost Gunner CNC Mill [soylentnews.org]
