What was only a vague concern ten years ago is now a reality: firearms made using 3D prints, untraceable, are circulating on the North American continent.…

Canada faces rising seizures of illegally printed firearms

Many sites exist to purchase the most sensitive firearm components.

Everything else can be made with a 3D printer.

Text by: Léopold Picot Follow

5 mins

What was only a vague concern ten years ago is now a reality: firearms made using 3D prints, untraceable, are circulating on the North American continent.

Coming from the United States, the phenomenon is gaining momentum in Canada.

Advertising

From our correspondent in Montreal,

Imagine.

You log on to a site and pay a few tens of dollars to buy a program and an assembly kit.

You run this program in your 3D printer, bought for $300, and within hours, a plastic assault rifle stock takes shape.

You only have to tinker for half a day, the time to fix together the stock and metal parts ordered legally, and you have a firearm.

Impossible ?

In the United States, the practice is legal.

In Canada, it is illegal, but more and more individuals are trying the experiment.

Uptrend

A trend that worries police authorities across Canada, who are increasingly confronted with printed weapons.

Radio Canada echoed this

at the start of the year, conducting the survey with dozens of provincial services.

The figures are instructive.

In Calgary, Alberta, police had seized two illegally printed firearms in 2020 and 2021. In 2022, seventeen printed firearms were seized.

In total, the police said they had recovered the same year 100 firearms built using 3D printing across Canada, but provinces such as Quebec did not wish to communicate on the subject.

“

My police sources tell me that the phenomenon is on the increase, even here in Quebec, in the small town of Trois-Rivières, where printed weapons were seized a few weeks ago from someone who produced them at home

” , confides Francis Langlois, associate member of the Observatory on the United States of the University of Quebec and expert on the issue of firearms in the United States and Canada.

an american idea

The issue is far from new.

Cody Wilson

, a libertarian American from Texas, became, in 2012, the standard bearer of gun printing.

He had then demonstrated the possibility of printing a pistol.

He has since fought to allow home-made printing in the name of the first two amendments to the US Constitution,

winning his case in 2018

under President Donald Trump.

Its website is now a reference in the field, and Americans can now print 3D weapons at home.

The difference compared to 2012 is the recent technological advances and the adaptation of users, which have allowed the development of the practice.

While the pistol invented by Cody Wilson only fired six shots before destroying itself, guns produced today by printing last longer.

Budding manufacturers have adapted, remarks Francis Langlois: "

We see more and more hybrid weapons, whose less critical components are printed in polymer, a material that has become more resistant over the years, and the rest is made up of metal parts

In 2021, Joe Biden tried to curb the phenomenon by specifically targeting the delivery of weapon components.

“

Since the federal government has the power to regulate trade between states in the Union, Joe Biden has tightened the screws on carriers like UPS and other Fedex of this world.
It has become more complex to export this kind of metal parts.

The US federal authorities have therefore extended the definition of a firearm a little by targeting its major components, which can no longer be delivered between states.

But it is still possible to make 3D weapons by ordering metal components within the same state.

However, this way of assembling weapons is also making its way across the border.

Bypass the law, adapt the law?

In Canada, the possession of weapons has been increasingly regulated since the 1970s. In this perspective, it is forbidden to print firearms at home.

But a Canadian can very well order spare metal parts on the internet, use his 3D printer to draw the missing parts, and obtain a completely untraceable weapon.

The real challenge is therefore to systematically trace the metal parts, and not just number the butt, reproducible in 3D.

This is one of the points on which Bill C-21, which will modify the regulation of firearms in Canada, will have to be resolved in the coming months.

Francis Langlois was also invited by the committee in charge of his evaluation.

“

One of my recommendations was to force manufacturers to identify all components of a weapon.
We should broaden the definition of a firearm, from the barrel to the breech, including the trigger, put serial numbers on these components, and ask the people who buy them, who produce them, to have a license , or in any case at least, to notify the authorities

”, says the researcher.

But the phenomenon of 3D printing is not yet the priority when it comes to firearms.

For Francis Langlois, the risk is still marginal with regard to the 400 million weapons legally in circulation in the US neighbour.

“

Mexico, like Canada, has the same concern: some of these weapons regularly cross borders.

The 3D printing of firearms will therefore become a real issue when it becomes really difficult to obtain a weapon on the American continent.

Canada faces rising seizures of illegally printed firearms

Canada faces rising seizures of illegally printed firearms

Uptrend

an american idea

Bypass the law, adapt the law?

You may like

Trends 24h

Latest