Early studies show that 3D printers may leave behind similar toolmarks on repeated prints.
All of this represents a deeply flawed understanding of how such “tracing” works. In order for this to accomplish anything you have to have both the printed gun part and the printer that made it already in your forensics lab, which means whoever you’re trying to hassle has already been caught. This might help secure a conviction after the fact by being able to conclude that, yes, part A was probably printed on printer B. It absolutely will not allow any random beat cop to grab any random printed gun off the street and be able to proclaim, “Ah, yes. This was printed by Bob Smith at 123 Maple Street,” or whatever hyperbolic fantasy these authoritarian types are always wishing for.
The risk here is cocksure but incompetent investigators inevitably generating a shitton of false positives and charging/convicting the wrong people just because they happen to own a 3D printer, and judges and juries believing them. This kind of thing already happens in established fields of forensics all time and if they couch everything in enough authoritative sounding language nobody who doesn’t already know a whole bunch about the topic is going to be able to call them out on it.
This kind of thing already happens in established fields of forensics all time and if they couch everything in enough authoritative sounding language nobody who doesn’t already know a whole bunch about the topic is going to be able to call them out on it.
Bingo, the goal is not to actually trace 3d printed guns, it’s to add another piece of evidence they can slap onto the target of their investigation to improve the chance of getting a conviction. Whether the accused is actually guilty of anything is truly irrelevant to the intended purpose of these kind of things, they are in practice assumed guilty by the prosecution unless proven innocent. The point is simply to make a convincing case to a judge or jury.
There’s also all the mess of slicer and printer settings. It would be interesting to give someone a collection of parts with different nozzle sizes, extrusion widths, pressure advance settings, temp settings, print speeds/accelerations, etc
Exactly!
The belief that forensics is reliable is unfounded. I don’t know the stat but last I remember reading it, it’s pretty low that they can prove anyone did anything. More murderers haven’t been caught than have.
More murderers haven’t been caught than have.
this is a shit way to describe things. more criminals of all types haven’t been caught. saying therefore there’s no rational foundation for forensics is ridiculous.
Look I’m all for calling out bad experts and pseudoscience all day. Lie Detectors? fuck 'em.
But you’re not going to convince me forensic pathology - like finding someone’s DNA under a victim’s finger nails - is bunk.
And you’re casting a wide fuckin’ net there.
Way to overthink it.
lol, you saying forensics is unreliable. you’re underthinking, or simply ignorant.
overthink it, that’s a problem where you come from huh? you don’t refute shit, you just say something pithy and consider that equivalent. what a mental failure.
Re-slice in different positions, use a few different slicers and printers, got it. Thanks for the pro tip 👍🏻
Just change nozzles every print, you can get cheap Chinese nozles for less than a $1 a pop.
I think there was a study that showed every 3d printer leaves a sort of fingerprint, and they can identify which printer printed what object.
In a lab, probably. In reality? No. Print nozzles wear over time and their patterns will change accordingly, and they are entirely replaced often.
Won’t stop DAs from insisting on using it in court though.
I would think that the entire idea of a disposable item would be that you can get rid of it after use. In case of something that is 3d printed, you just need a small container of acetone to put it in. After a bit you are just left with some goop.
On top of that, nozzles that are actually used (especially the cheap ones) wear down and never would keep the same marks.
These 3d printed items have been known and used for decades already (Bruce Willis even used one in one of his movies, back in the day). There is no sure way to trace them any more. Somebody could use a file from 15years ago, before all this was big news.
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I would think it’s a very non-american problem, though. They already have super easy access to real guns. It’s all the other countries with gun restrictions that need to worry about printed guns.
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You might want to go back and read my comment again :)
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