Why can't the manufacturers market "smart guns" outside the US? Surely, the NRA's grip isn't world-spanning.
Glock, Koch, Taurus, even Czech Zbrojovka all sell to US.
Kalashnikov can’t atm, but also probably doesn’t share the safety concern.
They want the gun to be available to them, and not be under duress to use a fingerprint reader or pin pad or RFID ring to do it.
Responsible gun owners keep guns out of children's hands by locking them up or supervising them, and irresponsible ones aren't going to want to pay extra for smart features.
I think there's a very narrow range of smart features, something like a gun that is unlocked when removed from a holster, but locks up if it is dropped or grabbed, that might be interesting. That makes having the gun taken from an officer less of a threat, which might have an institutional appeal. Give it a 10-hour maintenance mode so that it can be used as a "nightstand gun" while automatically being locked if left idle for longer, and it would basically meet the needs of police both on and off-duty.
A smart gun is like an AWS authenticated motor twisting ballpoint pen. Just no one ever seriously pays for such a thing, and it has not even been seriously made if it ever was actually conceived. Making it a requirement is basically out of question.
Why? If there’s the political will, it is doable. There are Australian gun manufacturers (e.g. Lithgow Arms, owned by Thales)-and if none of them are willing to cooperate, the government can always start their own gun manufacturer. Indeed, Lithgow Arms was founded in 1912 as a government-owned arms manufacturer, and remained in public hands until the Australian federal government sold it to Thales in 2006.
Post-war Commonwealth nations are generally bad at gun designs as well - UK tried once and produced an infantry rifle that will(not could) seriously injure its user if held and fired in left hand. So even if forced, the approved gun will be more of a theoretical product, and the smart gun mandate will just be a less politically viable alternative to total firearms ban.
Many tanks and planes do have smart guns. Electronic firing control with additional software features that impede firing are beneficial and totally fine at that scale.
Most(though not all) other smart gun attempts work in a similar fashion; the host gun works exactly as it were, except an extraneous metal bit inhibits firing. If the bit was removed or held down, it reverts to the original host gun and fires normally. As such, the extra bit is literally extraneous, irrelevant to the gun's working.
The military would love a smart gun to cut down on accidental discharges. Cops would love it to stop weapons being used against cops.
The issue is that it has to have a very high reliability (you don’t want it to fail to fire while a suspect is shooting at you). And not much point if it only works “sometimes” with unauthorized users.
Most of the world doesn’t need that whole setup because:
- Our cultural baseline around firearms is completely different. Countries like Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, Austria, and the Czech Republic have plenty of guns at home - and historically, a lot of them were actual assault rifles, not “looks-spicy” semiautos.
- We treat guns like weapons. They live in safes, not nightstands, and kids get taught safety early, the same way you’d teach them not to put a fork in a power supply.
None of those countries are anywhere near US levels of gun ownership. See the table here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_g...
USA has 120 guns pr 100 citizens. Of the countries on your list, Finland is next with 32. Denmark has 10.
> and historically, a lot of them were actual assault rifles
Fully automatic weapons are not legal for civilians in Denmark at least.
Many semiautos are also banned. Semiauto shotguns must be restricted to hold only two shells and you need a special license even for that.
I don’t disagree with your general point, but you’re not making a good comparison IMO.
Same in Finland.
1. Temper resistance is not temper impossibility 2. If a tag allows tracking, bad actors might track good actors?
2.5 million years ago, a friend of mine
Made a tool from a stone and defended his tribe
It's technology, sorry for the technical term
It's a wheel then a fire and the rest is a blur