I have a mental image of a pistol that requires a nuclear-launch-sequence type of procedure to fire – two keys, a few authentication codes, the whole nine yards.
Actually, I can see this being an effective way to keep stolen guns from being useful to the thief. You know, effective, if impractical, prohibitively expensive, practically uneforceable, and generally silly. But that is one purpose it would serve, until someone figures out a quick and dirty method to disable the password-protect on the gun.
Personally, I get far more amusement from the concept of spoofing the ammo. See, you pretty much have to let the code be the final trigger to set it off, nothing mechanical can be allowed.
So… how does it know what order to fire the bullets in the clip in?
What if you bombard a police station with white noise? How powerful a transmitter does Captain Midnight need before he blows all the ammo?
Contrawise, why not just EMP the cops and disarm them?
I think this is what it’s for. I’m not saying it’s the bestest idea evar; I’m just saying that it’s not nearly so dumb as the OP describes it. YOu’re not typing the password in a “self-defense situation”: you’re typing it ahead of time. That’s the only point I’m making–and UncleBeer, as someone who has come into plenty of threads to correct errors in the OP (usually with a lot of cussin), you above all ought to appreciate that!
Daniel
The computer I got in my last job came with biometrics, specifically fingerprints.
It didn’t work for 5 days of the month… I’ll let y’all figure out which 5 and yes, I’m female. :smack:
On the plus side, now you know that it’s probably safe for you to glovelessly commit heinous crimes and misdemeanors on those days. If a setpiece scanner can’t recognize the fingers themselves, the FBI’ll never figure out who you are just from the prints.
Or maybe the key could be single-use. Every time you wanna open the lock again, you gotta get a notarized approval from your local chief of police and send it off to the lock manufacturer to get a new key sent to you by certified mail - in a kevlar envelope. And you need to show an FOID card to retrieve that letter from the post office. And proof of personal liability insurance.
And wouldn’t do one damn thing for the 200 million plus guns already in circulation in the U.S. Guns that have a useful service life around a hundred years.
Oh, I do appreciate and understand your point. I appreciate its stupidity and understand it ain’t workable.
Well sure, but you’re probably not including kids up to 19 years old and you’re also ignoring those who get involved in gangs and those who commit suicide.
What else are you ignoring, UncleBeer?
[quote=What else are you ignoring, UncleBeer?]
Heh. Anything and everything which doesn’t fit into my point of view so conveniently.
This is a great idea. The second key, of course, is held by the person you are going to shoot.
Shooter: “C’mon, man, give me your key.”
Target: “No way.”
Shooter: “I really need it.”
Target: “Not gonna happen.”
Shooter: “Dude…”
You understand the stupidity of my point?
Daniel
I can see the advantage of the biometric thing, if it’s cost effective and reliable. Key my fingerprints to my gun. If it ain’t me, the trigger doesn’t work and the gun doesn’t fire.
But what’s up with the “keyed ammunition”? The biometric thing would work great as a simple trigger lock, preventing gun operation by anyone but the owner. Keying ammunition to a single gun gets you … what? As someone said upthread, I can’t think of anything this gets you over a trigger lock. A new, improved, biometric-based trigger lock, but a trigger lock all the same.
Oh noes, now the geeks will finally have incentive to become violent…
“Give me all your USB cords, or I’ll have to <pushes up glasses> use my TI-89 with firewire Tech 9 attachment”
The whole aproach to gun safety are very simple rules. They work if you follow them.
Adding complexity and a completly new and different electronic system to a simple tool that already does exatly what it is supposed to do is an invatation to failure.
Re: the biometric trigger lock.
What if I have a cut on my finger? What if my hands are dirty?
What if I’ve been sanding drywall all day on Saturday and I want to relax and go do some target shooting on Sunday?
What if I burned my finger on the stove, campfire or cigar?
What if I fell off my bike and scraped my finger?
What if I have a piece of dog or cat hair on my finger?
It’s all bullshit my friends. Anti-gun folks refuse to learn anything about guns and believe that anything that makes it harder, or more expensive to use a gun is a good thing.
I’m surprised no-one’s tried to develop a gun like the ones seen in the movie Westworld- they’ve got a heat sensor under the barrel, and if they detect body heat, the gun won’t fire.
Sure, totally useless for self-defence (and hunting), but there are plenty of gun owners all over the world who have never fired their gun anywhere except a shooting range, don’t feel the need to keep a gun in the house for self-defence, and don’t go hunting.
Certainly, you’d think there would be a potential market- at least enough to make some prototypes…
Nor will it work if the batteries go dead. How many of us regularly check the batteries in things we keep stashed for emergencies? And just because they work today, doesn’t mean they won’t go flat tomorrow.