The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has published a damning article about efforts to control 3D printers.
What’s pushing them to react so strongly? It’s the work of legislators in several US states that are attempting to enact new laws that will strongly control the use and sale of 3D printers.
Their goal is to reduce the possibility of “ghost guns”, as some critical parts can theoretically be produced on desktop 3D printers with the right materials and 3D models. These weapons have been plaguing police forces everywhere, and the legislation is a knee-jerk reaction to the situation.
What is it they intend on doing? While several states now have enacted laws to outlaw the use of 3D printers to produce these components — and even holding the related 3D models — there are a couple of states that want to go much further. Specifically, they want ALL 3D printers in their regions to operate with government-authorized software that will check any prospective print job to ensure that it is not one of the weapon components.
While the concept seems valid at first glance, it is extremely detrimental to the 3D print industry.
I can understand why legislators might want this: photocopy machines have special features to prevent copying of printed currency, for example. But that’s very different than the 3D printer situation: currency is a fixed design, but weapon components can take many shapes.
The effects on the industry would be near catastrophic in the long run, since the technology is still evolving, and that evolution depends massively on the shared use of open source tools.
None of the open source tools could be used on the machines if the legislation is passed because only certified software/firmware would be permitted. And that can only be produced by the major 3D printer manufacturers. Effectively, community development would cease, leaving all future development of 3D print technology to a few big companies that would have no other competition.
The situation, should the legislation pass, is so dire that the EFF recently published a long piece on the perils of the proposed laws. There are two parts to the piece; be sure to read both.
EFF raises another major concern: if 3D printers are always set up to block printing of certain undesirable 3D models — weapons — then it is a simple step later to add other items to the undesirable list.
An example might be a spare part design for a farm tractor, where the tractor manufacturer wants to block anyone from making their own parts — so that they can sell them instead at inflated prices. There are countless other examples possible, ranging from spare parts to trademarked material.
The proposals are really just security theatre, because it would be trivial to get around model checking. One way, suggested by the EFF, would be to print a banned component embedded within another, and just remove it after printing. There’s no guaranteed way to actually block these 3D models.
Yet the rules would, theoretically, extend to all of the ten million plus 3D printers now installed around the world. All of them would potentially be affected because a handful, maybe at most a thousand, have at one time printed bad stuff.
I’m with the EFF on this one, and you should be, too.
