Welcome to the Future of Gun Control
Source: motherjones.com
Jonathan Mossberg wanted to be the Steve Jobs of firearms.
In 1999, a few years before the invention of the iPod, Mossberg began to build the iGun, a computer-chip-equipped "smart gun" that could only be fired by its owner. (The "i" stands for intelligence.) He saw the technology as a commonsense way to prevent gun violence—a no-brainer safety device like seatbelts or air bags. The iGun is a shotgun equipped with a radio frequency identification (RFID) sensor that only allows it to be fired by someone wearing a special ring. By 2000, a fully functional version had endured a grueling round of military-grade testing and was ready to hit the market. "When I filed my patents, my patent attorney said, 'You've got the next dot-com,'" Mossberg recalls. "He was blown away."
Mossberg wasn't the first person to envision a smart gun, but he was well positioned to make it a reality. He was a scion of O.F. Mossberg & Sons, the nation's oldest family-owned gun company, which makes one of the world's best-selling lines of pump-action shotguns. He'd overseen manufacturing for the company and had also served as president of Uzi America, an importer of Israeli weapons.
But the iGun hit a wall. Consumers were skeptical, in part because gun rights groups had been painting smart guns as a Trojan horse for gun grabbers. A few years earlier, gun manufacturer Colt had unveiled a smart-watch-activated pistol, and Smith & Wesson had pledged to explore "authorized user technology" for its weapons. Both projects were abandoned in the face of withering criticism from the National Rifle Association, which led a boycott of Smith & Wesson. In 2005, under pressure from the NRA, Congress passed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, making gun manufacturers immune from lawsuits related to gun accidents or misuse—and removing another incentive to develop smart guns. (Today, the NRA says it doesn't oppose smart guns but claims they are an attempt to make firearms more expensive and "would allow guns to be disabled remotely.")
Ever since, no major firearms maker has touched the smart-gun concept—including O.F. Mossberg & Sons. "They are doing so well that they have little to gain," Mossberg says of his family's company (which he left in 2000). Though they see the benefits of smart guns, "should this turn into a Smith & Wesson boycott-type thing, they don't want to be associated with that. And I don't blame them."cared. This is nothing more than that."
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