A 3D-printed gun (Credit: Courier Mail)
Australian authorities have seized printed machineguns and warned that criminals are “embrac[ing] 3D technology”.
Courier Mail reported on the Australian Crime Commission’s fears that criminals have begun to “embrace 3D technology”, with some “making their own weapons, such as sub-machineguns”, with 3D printers. Police in Australia are said to have “already seized low-quality guns” produced with the technology, and added that they “expect crime gangs to take greater advantage of the 3D technology” in future.
In an organised crime report for 2015 released this week by the ACC, the “emergence of new threats” from the “illicit supply of firearms” included reference to “an online black market for firearms and firearm parts”, boosted by “ongoing developments in three-dimensional printing [that] have facilitated the creation of operative firearms”. The machines “provide those seeking to [produce guns] with the capability to successfully create a functional firearm and/or parts”.
So-called “digital mills” were capable of “creating firearm frames from aluminium”, and the ACC predicted that “organised crime can be expected to adapt its uptake in line with improvements in these products”. It added that a “small number” of criminals had already been producing both “single-shot and sub-machineguns”, with the former said to be “a confirmed concern to law enforcement as they are reliable, concealable and effective in firing ammunition”.
Chris Dawson, the ACC’s CEO, stated: “We’ve certainly had evidence and seized quite a number of what might be called homemade machineguns, which we’ve found in the possession of serious criminals. There is not a high prevalence of the 3D-printed ones (guns), but it is a matter that will be the subject of close monitoring.”
The Recycler reported in October 2012 on a US 3D printer company removing a 3D printer from a customer after the customer intended to print a replica gun with their machine.