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US ‘crypto-anarchist’ sees 3D-printed guns as fundamental right
AUSTIN, Aug 2, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – The US “crypto-anarchist” who caused panic
this week by publishing online blueprints for 3D-printed firearms said
Wednesday that whatever the outcome of a legal battle, he has already
succeeded in his political goal of spreading the designs far and wide.
A federal court judge blocked Texan Cody Wilson’s website on Tuesday by
issuing a temporary injunction.
Eight states had sued, arguing the blueprints could allow anyone — from a
teen to a “lone wolf” gunman — to make untraceable, undetectable plastic
weapons.
Wilson complied with the judge’s order and shut down his Defcad website,
which he wanted to turn into the “WikiLeaks of guns.”
But by then, the blueprints he had posted — after President Donald Trump’s
administration granted him permission to publish in a settlement to end a
five-year legal battle — had been downloaded thousands of times.
“No matter how badly I win or lose, you can download a gun from the
internet,” Wilson told AFP at the headquarters of Defense Distributed, the
company he runs out of a modest factory in Texas capital Austin.
“This attempt by these authorities to go into court and stifle this
information drove more people to the website to download it and spread it
deeper into the internet.”
Sporting a pair of gray jeans and a dark blue t-shirt, the 30-year-old with
a close-cropped beard wouldn’t appear out of place as a tech executive in
Silicon Valley.
The ideology he says he is driven by is a defense of the US constitution’s
first and second amendments — the rights to free speech and to bear arms.
Wilson believes the intense media attention he generated cemented one of
his principle goals: to use technology and the spread of gun-making
information as a permanent bulwark against any future attempts at gun control
in the US.
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“We believe that the firearm itself, this implement of violence, is an
essential component of force, of sovereignty,” he says.
He concedes that what he has done, and still wants to do, “offends the
conscience” of some people, but he says “it’s never been illegal in this
country to make a firearm — and the way that you make it shouldn’t affect
that law.”
– Anarchist philosophy –
Wilson ascribes to an anarchist philosophy that the free exchange of ideas
on the internet — in its absolute form — is a check on government.
“It’s a politics that predicted WikiLeaks, predicted Bitcoin, predicted
anonymous mail and anonymous communications online,” he says.
The law school dropout has dedicated the last five years of his life to the
cause of unfettered online access to gun-making information.
“I’m a publisher. At the end of the day, I do many things, but the main
thing that I strive to do is to take my information and put it on the
internet,” he says.
Defense Distributed, the company Wilson co-founded in 2013 and currently
heads, is more than a publishing firm — it sells actual firearms products.
It has created a machine called the “Ghost Gunner,” priced at $2,000.
Computer code operates the machine, which carves essential components of
various firearms to create weapons without serial numbers.
– ‘Ghost guns’ –
Such weapons — called “ghost guns” — are already being made by those who
can properly carve metal components. The “Ghost Gunner” takes away the need
for advanced skill and creates untraceable weapons.
The issue is far from academic. The Los Angeles Police Department last
month showcased a trove of “ghost” weapons it recovered from gang members.
Law enforcement cannot trace these weapons if they are used to commit crimes.
That is why lawmakers, law enforcement personnel, gun control groups and
even Trump himself expressed everything from panic to skepticism this week
when Wilson started distributing blueprints online.
Those blueprints included his company’s own creation, the “Liberator”
plastic gun — a sidearm that resembles something seen on science fiction TV
shows.
The potential impact of Wilson’s publication was worldwide. Any country
with uncensored access to the internet could see its gun control measures
circumvented with a click of a mouse.
“It is immediately obvious to anyone who looks at this issue that 3D-
printed guns are nothing short of a menace to society,” said Avery Gardiner,
co-president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.
“We will continue to do everything in our power to make sure that this
temporary halt in publication becomes a permanent one,” Gardiner said after
the injunction.
Wilson also plans to fight, just as he unsuccessfully fought in the courts
for five years.
The judge that ordered his website shut plans to hold a hearing on the
states’ lawsuit next week.
Wilson put out a call for donations to fund the legal challenge, but is
aware that he may be facing a losing battle.
“I believe that duty demands that I continue to fight it,” he said, while
admitting that “I think I’ll waste a lot of money.”
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