SYLVIA McKEOWN: Now you can 3D-print your own gun for free off the internet
US government’s decision to back down from five-year legal battle triggers alarm
As of today you can download the schematics for a wide range of 3D-printable guns, including a working AR-15, AR-10, the VZ.58 (a Czechoslovakian assault rifle) and a Beretta M9. In a shocking turn of events the Trump administration has quietly settled a five-year law suit with crypto-anarchist gun-runner Cody R Wilson and his company, Defense Distributed. They have given him the green light to resume uploading free computer-aided design (CAD) blueprints for the 3D-printable guns from August 1. The US government even paid $40,000 of his legal fees. Crypto-anarchism or cyberpunk activism is an online movement that weaponises innovations in technology with the aim to not only circumvent government control but rather to tear down the whole system altogether and enact social and political change. Wilson is the movement’s de facto leader. When the then 25-year-old Wilson started Defense Distributed in 2013, his first focus was creating lower receivers — the mechanism that houses the trig...
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