Encrypted Ammunition?

holy_calamity writes "A patent has been filed for bullets with built-in encryption. Pulling the trigger sends a radio signal to the cartridge in the chamber, but the charge only goes off if the right encryption key is sent. The aim is to improve civilian firearm security." Not sure I'm quite ready to trust the average techno-gadget failure rate on something like this just yet.

Re: Bullet encryption

[pi_rules]

sounds like a huge farfetched idea that some capital went to waste on.

Oh, it is, but there's a market for this stuff.

Three years after a "smart gun" is available on the market citizens of New Jersey won't be able to buy regular mechanical handguns anymore.

Police, of course, are exempt from this restriction.

Re:A big waste, considering the commodity...

[drinkypoo]

To top it off, how is a radio signal of sufficient strength going to get past that much lead? And what's to keep a bank robber or other criminal to carry a small EMP generator to effectively disarm any cop whose pistol is so equipped?

I will answer these very silly questions in order. (the other stuff, above that, was made up of good points.) First, lead? LEAD? You think the antenna's going to be at the end of the barrel? I think it's going to be wrapped around the ass end of the casing, or might even be the firing pin mechanism itself. Second, EMP? Haha haaHahaHAAHA! Do you have any idea how EMPs are generated, aside from using a nuclear weapon? You have a coil wrapped around a high explosive, you charge the coil with a lot of current, generating a strong magnetic field, and then you detonate the explosive. This causes the magnetic field to collapse simultaneously with the coil being collapsed, causing the field to fluctuate and move very rapidly through neighboring space, thus inducing the currents that destroy things. In part, it is similar in concept to a car's ignition coil. It's not something easily miniaturized, nor affordably carried.

What IS an issue for concern, however, is the ease and low cost of building a HERF device [google.com]. A low-power handheld HERF device was demonstrated at DEFCON, I believe, and was able to shut down computers from some distance.

Re:Guns.

[LeonardsLiver]

It's the second ammendment, not the first.

Put up your dukes? What if it's just your dukes against 10 or 20 dukes? What if it's your dukes against a knife? Dukes versus a baseball bat? What if you're ill, weak, elderly, etc...?

Gun control is a failure. In states that have allowed citizens to obtain concealed carry permits, violent crime has gone down markedly. I site the following snippet from Wikipedia as evidence. Feel free to go to the site & check the references yourself.

"The FBI's statistics in the 1992 Uniform Crime Report also concluded: "Violent crime rates are highest overall in states with laws limiting or prohibiting the carrying of concealed firearms for self-defense." [1] "The FBI's data also show that in 20 other states that issue CCW permits (including Arizona, Washington, Oregon, Tennessee, Wyoming, and others), these states have enjoyed a REDUCTION in crime as follows: 1) Violent crime rates are LOWER by 21%. 2) Homicide rates are LOWER by 33% 3) Robbery rates are LOWER by 37% and 4) Aggravated assaults are lower by 13%."[2]"

Re:This could be bad

[keyne9]

More importantly, "What happens when the Government decides you shouldn't shoot your gun?"

Re:Guns.

[truthsearch]

And what changed between NYC being an unsafe city to being a safer city? Gun laws? No, not much. The police force was drastically increased in size. That and the nationwide drop in crime since abortions became legal and common helped make NYC much safer.

And what makes you think it's almost impossible to buy a gun in NYC? If you have no criminal record you can have a permit after waiting the required time. Then go shopping. I know people who have legal firearms in this city.

Re:Please be honest:

[Anonymous Coward]

"In areas where right-to-carry is present, violent crimes go down. In areas (or whole countries) where guns are banned, violent crimes go way up."

Um. . . no.

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_tot_cri_perc ap-crime-total-crimes-per-capita [nationmaster.com]

Re:Please be honest:

[ScentCone]

Um. . . no.

If by "no," you mean "yes," then you're correct! Crime per capita has nothing to do with it. It's the change in crime per capita and the nature of that crime before/after gun bans (or liberalization in ownership) that we're talking about.

One year after a sweeping ban/confiscation program in Australia, they had these charming results:

• homicdes up 3.2%
• assaults up 8.6%
• armed robberies up 44% (!!)
• in Victoria, homicides with firearms up 300%
• 25-year downward trends in armed robbery and homicides with firearms reversed

and so on. This program cost Australia about half a billion dollars, and now many lives. Much the same story in Scotland.

Re:Please be honest:

[imroy]

In areas where right-to-carry is present, violent crimes go down. In areas (or whole countries) where guns are banned, violent crimes go way up.

Really? I'd like to see those statistics. I live in a country where most private gun ownership was banned ten years ago and I don't believe our crime rate has gone up. And look at the UK, where not even the regular police have guns. So I'm calling bullshit on your unsourced assertion.

But in cases where the conceptual deterrent isn't really registering with some punk, the far, far more common defense is called "brandishing." Showing someone the gun and a willingness to use it generally defuses the situation.

Right. Unless they also have a gun, or there's several of them, or you're overpowered and have the gun taken. My problem with guns is that they're just so dangerous. There's almost no room for error or mistake. Take a situation where tempers and/or fears are in a hightened state, with probably a lot of adrenaline (and possibly other substances) flowing. Add a gun or guns and the situation has the potential to end tragically for either party or by-standers. I'm glad you were able to defend youself from a "drug-addled bruiser" with your gun, but you seem to have convinced yourself that the gun was the only thing that saved you. Admitedly I wasn't there, but I'm sure there were alternatives.

As to using a gun "on the land" to protect yourself and property/animals, I have no problem there. My concern is in city and urban environments. My understanding is that a lot of guns perchased for personal protection are often poorly stored (handbag, briefcase, glove box, desk drawer, etc) and end up getting stolen. They then get sold to gangs and can, ironically enough, be used in home invasions. It's this "sloppy" gun ownership that I'm concerned about. I strongly believe that no-one needs a gun in a city or urban environment, and that wide-spread ownership only makes the whole crime situation worse, whether stolen or not. And I live in a country that largely confirms that belief.

Re:peaceful protest always trumps armed "protest"

[Impotent_Emperor]

In the Civil Rights era, although most protestors/activists did not publicly display guns, some or many did in fact keep them around. Martin Luther King, Jr. himself never was publicly seen with a gun (I believe), but his hangers-on did have rifles, shotguns, and pistols in order to protect MLK from the Klan and other groups that might try to kill him.

Some civil rights workers also carried guns when working in the South to fend off KKK attacks.

There was an incident in South (or North?) Carolina where black WWII veterans were attacked by the Klan. They used their guns to fight them off. That same Klan group later tried to stage an even against the Lumbee Indians, but the Lumbees used their guns to drive the Klan away.

The Black Panthers carried weapons openly, bringing them into public buildings. This is what actually led to the passing of many laws that forbid the carrying of weapons. Before this, you could carry whatever you wanted and no one cared. In NYC and D.C. during the 1960s, kids could carry their .22 rifles to their local ranges without a care in the world. Today, the cops would kill you on sight.

So, I was just trying to illustrate that people during the Civil Rights era did have guns, some good (like MLK) and some not so good (the Black Panthers) and their effects on society were different.

Re:A big waste, considering the commodity...

[drinkypoo]

The description of the device you linked to is just a capacitor-fed HERF, not an EMP device.

You'd like to see?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1440764.stm [bbc.co.uk]
http://www.reason.com/0211/fe.jm.gun.shtml [reason.com]
http://www.infowars.com/articles/ps/gun_ban_utopia _creates_crime.htm. [infowars.com] http://www.gunblast.com/British_Crime_Soars.htm [gunblast.com]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/607623.stm [bbc.co.uk]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lott [wikipedia.org]

Now, I fully expect you to dismiss most of these links out of hand because they come from 'biased' sources. I also fully expect that you will not do even the bare minimum of research nessesary to form a coherant opinion on your own, beyond the kneejerk post above mine. I myself have only posted the most interesting links from the front page of the Google search I conducted, and I know better sources exist. So really, I suppose I can't be disappointed this way, nor have I wasted too much time.