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Comment by jkubicek | Hacker News Reader

This is absolutely terrible. This is a perfect example of the persecution gun owners fear when they're asked to register their weapons. We need more gun registration and exposing data like this does nothing but hinder that goal.

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Not if criminals use the data to avoid these houses. Then people might register in greater numbers. They might buy a gun just to get on the public list.

This may be an effect, but while some criminals want to avoid a confrontation with a gun-wielding resident... others want to steal guns. By helping criminals self-sort to the right targets for the risks they prefer, the net effect on crime/safety could be negative, by shifting break-ins to where they are most likely to succeed.

Is gun theft ever really that much of a specific goal? Seems guns are easy enough to get on the street that breaking into a house just to steal guns has a much higher risk than is normally necessary.

EDIT: Well that didn't take long to acquire a silent Reddit-style "independent-thought downvote."

You'd be suprised: http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2012/11/thieves_break...

That's one instance with a very large (no?) safe. I was asking about the prevalence of that kind of crime, not whether it had ever happened before in the history of weapons, or theft itself.

Yes, especially if you simply observe a house known to have guns and take them when the owners are not home.

I realize how the concept of theft works.

From what I've gathered from various friends and acquaintances working in law enforcement and criminal justice, the vast majority of criminals are really not the kind of intelligent folks who would do such research. That's why they're criminals. The sophisticated type you see in television is very rare.

Two variables of risk that factor into a criminal's decision:

1) Is the house occupied? 2) Are the occupants armed?

Providing an answer to the second question only helps the criminal by letting them know that they can perform an armed robbery with no resistance.

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