Federal gun sales databse

[Rafe]

John Lott weighs in:

Democrats Pushing Gun Registry as Precursor to Gun Ban

Two-thirds of Republicans believe the policy will lead to gun confiscation, and even 40 percent of Democrats believe the same. Confiscating legally owned firearms, it seems, is not merely a right-wing conspiracy theory.

Confiscation is the only thing registration is good for:

In a 2001 lawsuit, the Pennsylvania state police could not identify any crimes solved by their registration system from 1901 to 2001; however they did claim that it had “assisted” in a total of four cases, for which they could provide no details.

In a 2013 deposition for District of Columbia v. Heller II, the plaintiffs recorded that the Washington, D.C. police chief could not “recall any specific instance where registration records were used to determine who committed a crime, except for possession offenses.”

During testimony before the Hawaii State Senate in 2000, Honolulu’s police chief stated that he couldn’t find any crimes that had been solved due to registration and licensing. The chief also said that his officers devoted about 50,000 hours to registering and licensing guns each year. This is time that could have been spent on traditional, time-tested law enforcement activities.

New York and Maryland spent tens of millions of dollars putting together a computer database on all new guns sold in the past 15 years, even recording the ballistic fingerprint of each gun. But even these states, which strongly favor gun control, eventually abolished their systems because they never solved a single crime.

But, hey, it's only common sense, right? So what if it's provably useless to law enforcement and costs millions and millions of dollars and consumes the already very limited amounts of law enforcement officer time and training. It's just common sense that the government would want to know where all the guns are, right? And it isn't just the guy living on rural property who has a circa 1980 double-barrel shotgun to take birds. No, what we really need to know about are the people who have arsenals of two or more guns and over 100 rounds of ammunition. After all, domestic extremism is the number one threat to our democracy--the government has been telling us that over and over throughout the Biden administration--and we need to keep track of all these right-wingers. It's only common sense.

Wait. What? I thought there were about 300 million guns in civilian hands in the United States. What do you mean there could be as many as one billion?! How are we ever going to confisca... I mean, how will we be able to understand who has them without a federal database?

</sarcasm>

[Rafe]

Seems like a reasonable place to put my updated NICS data (attached). As of February 1, 2022, there have been 414,167,642 completed NICS checks since the program began at the end of 1998. The 20-year period ending with December 2021 accounts for 384,091,593 of those checks.

The BATF tracks the production (of course it's the fire-control "firearm" part of the firearm only) of all federally licensed firearm manufacturers in the U.S., but I can't find data for 2020 yet, only through 2019. Going back several years those numbers are:

• 2019: 7,011,945
• 2018: 9,052,628
• 2017: 8,327,792
• 2016: 11,497,441
• 2015: 9,358,661
• 2014: 9,050,626
• 2013: 10,844,792
• 2012: 8,578,610

That's a total of 73,722,495; the total of 2000 through 2019 is 123,096,334. Additionally, the BATF also tracks the importation of firearms into the U.S., but I've had more difficulty finding data for that. I found info for 2020, though, and the total number of imported firearms topped 6.83 million. Interestingly, Turkey was the largest importer with 1,490,251...Canik Arms alone can't account for those numbers...with Austria second and Brazil third.

So if we use the 2018 manufacturing numbers of 9.06 million (because they were a bit higher than the flanking 2017 and 2019) and the 2020 imports of 6.83 million, that's about a 75% ratio of imports to U.S. manufactured. Extrapolating that for each year 2012 through 2019 would give us 55,291,871 imported firearms, and for 2000 through 2019 inclusive, 92,322,251. The local plus import total for 2000 through 2019, then, would be about 215,418,585 newly manufactured firearms entering the marketplace, or about 10.77 million each year on average for the past 20 years.

[Paladin]

The local plus import total for 2000 through 2019, then, would be about 215,418,585 newly manufactured firearms entering the marketplace, or about 10.77 million each year on average for the past 20 years.

That is a lot of guns!! I wouldn't be shocked if there were over 500 million guns in the US. Certainly the NICS checks show a whole lot more guns are being sold than produced, and the NICS checks don't apply to all transactions.

[Rafe]

The local plus import total for 2000 through 2019, then, would be about 215,418,585 newly manufactured firearms entering the marketplace, or about 10.77 million each year on average for the past 20 years.

That is a lot of guns!! I wouldn't be shocked if there were over 500 million guns in the US. Certainly the NICS checks show a whole lot more guns are being sold than produced, and the NICS checks don't apply to all transactions.

Yeppers. I personally think NICS checks is a trailing indicator of general interest in owning firearms rather than any indication about the number in people's hands. You've got all the dealer-handled transfers and such in there but--and one of you FFLs should correct me--even though we have to fill-out a 4473 for a purchase from a dealer, with a CHL/LTC I don't believe it ever hits the system as an NICS check; other states have similar license perks. If correct, there's probably some offsetting of those numbers going on. And I really thought 2021's November and December would nudge us over into a new annual NICS record total, but we didn't quite make it.

I honestly think 500 million firearms in civilian hands is quite realistic, maybe even a tad low. I mean, a decently maintained firearm will last for decades. Glock started selling handguns in 1988 (seems a lot more recent than that, but that's just because I'm getting older), and unless destroyed every single one of those should still be running; and even M1 Garands manufactured in the late '30s are still in use and changing hands. No batteries required. That's one of the very basic appeals of firearms to me: so much stuff we use in our daily lives today needs external energy to run and typically has a limited lifespan. Guns are old-school mechanical: you take care of them and they can last for generations.

[tk1700]

tk1700, thanks for sharing that.

Questions:

What software system are you using for 4473s?
Is that (or is there) an industry standard, or are there other software packages for this purpose?
How does the system store the 4473s - a database, PDf, CSV etc. ?
Does it store information other than the 4473 - Photo ID scans for example?

Any other FFLs want to share your experience?

There are several companies that license software for gun stores. Ours is Merchant Magic. It writes a track in the bound book for every transaction of a serial numbered item, ie received in the store, sold, sent out for repair, returned to manufacturer, etc.

As I understand it, ATF has to approve the software before it can be used for firearms transactions. I don't know what all that entails nor do I want to know, lol!

They are stored as a PDF attached to the receipt for the transaction (sale or transfer). If we want to look at a 4473 from history we can find it with a serial number search or using the customers name and going to the receipt.

[mrvmax]

tk1700, thanks for sharing that.

Questions:

What software system are you using for 4473s?
Is that (or is there) an industry standard, or are there other software packages for this purpose?
How does the system store the 4473s - a database, PDf, CSV etc. ?
Does it store information other than the 4473 - Photo ID scans for example?

Any other FFLs want to share your experience?

I'm an FFL and already spelled it out. There is no standard software, there are multiple software companies with their own product.

[mrvmax]

The local plus import total for 2000 through 2019, then, would be about 215,418,585 newly manufactured firearms entering the marketplace, or about 10.77 million each year on average for the past 20 years.

That is a lot of guns!! I wouldn't be shocked if there were over 500 million guns in the US. Certainly the NICS checks show a whole lot more guns are being sold than produced, and the NICS checks don't apply to all transactions.

You've got all the dealer-handled transfers and such in there but--and one of you FFLs should correct me--even though we have to fill-out a 4473 for a purchase from a dealer, with a CHL/LTC I don't believe it ever hits the system as an NICS check; other states have similar license perks.

You are correct, they have no way of knowing how many transactions I've done with LTC holders except for multiple purchases (which I commented on already) and during audits(which they can look through them all during the audit).

[Paladin]

with a CHL/LTC I don't believe it ever hits the system as an NICS check

True. The ATF is almost certainly capturing LTC purchase information with the electronic 4473, but that would not show up on the NICS check count.

The NICS number don't count homemade firearms either.

[KC5AV]

tk1700, thanks for sharing that.

Questions:

What software system are you using for 4473s?
Is that (or is there) an industry standard, or are there other software packages for this purpose?
How does the system store the 4473s - a database, PDf, CSV etc. ?
Does it store information other than the 4473 - Photo ID scans for example?

Any other FFLs want to share your experience?

There are several companies that license software for gun stores. Ours is Merchant Magic. It writes a track in the bound book for every transaction of a serial numbered item, ie received in the store, sold, sent out for repair, returned to manufacturer, etc.

As I understand it, ATF has to approve the software before it can be used for firearms transactions. I don't know what all that entails nor do I want to know, lol!

They are stored as a PDF attached to the receipt for the transaction (sale or transfer). If we want to look at a 4473 from history we can find it with a serial number search or using the customers name and going to the receipt.

If a voting machine can phone home, why can’t an electronic 4473 terminal?

[mrvmax]

with a CHL/LTC I don't believe it ever hits the system as an NICS check

True. The ATF is almost certainly capturing LTC purchase information with the electronic 4473, but that would not show up on the NICS check count.

The NICS number don't count homemade firearms either.

That's impossible, the ATF has no access to a gun stores computers. The FFL software is on the business computer that the FFL owns.

[mrvmax]

tk1700, thanks for sharing that.

Questions:

What software system are you using for 4473s?
Is that (or is there) an industry standard, or are there other software packages for this purpose?
How does the system store the 4473s - a database, PDf, CSV etc. ?
Does it store information other than the 4473 - Photo ID scans for example?

Any other FFLs want to share your experience?

There are several companies that license software for gun stores. Ours is Merchant Magic. It writes a track in the bound book for every transaction of a serial numbered item, ie received in the store, sold, sent out for repair, returned to manufacturer, etc.

As I understand it, ATF has to approve the software before it can be used for firearms transactions. I don't know what all that entails nor do I want to know, lol!

They are stored as a PDF attached to the receipt for the transaction (sale or transfer). If we want to look at a 4473 from history we can find it with a serial number search or using the customers name and going to the receipt.

If a voting machine can phone home, why can’t an electronic 4473 terminal?

Explain to me how the ATF is hacking into my PC to access software I purchased to do firearm transactions. I don't think you guys understand the idea behind it. It's not a program run by the ATF, private businesses develop the software and FFLS buy it. The ATF is not involved in any of it except to approve it's use.

[Rex B]

I’m not concerned about small business FFLs
It’s the Cabelas, Bass Pros, and Academies that concern me.

[srothstein]

Explain to me how the ATF is hacking into my PC to access software I purchased to do firearm transactions. I don't think you guys understand the idea behind it. It's not a program run by the ATF, private businesses develop the software and FFLS buy it. The ATF is not involved in any of it except to approve it's use.

I do not believe it is happening BUT it is possible. I am going to make two assumptions about your computer system which may or may not be true. If they are true (and I believe they are true for 99% of the FFLs), this is easy for the ATF to do and if the assumptions are not true then the ATF will only be missing a few stores worth of data. Assumption number 1 is that you are running the software on a local computer that is connected to a server for data storage. If this is not true and you are running the software and the data all on one local computer, then your store is so small the ATF would not care. But this makes assumption 2 almost guaranteed to be true and that is the critical one. Assumption 2 is that your server is connected to the internet. I doubt there are very many computers not connected to the internet any more. There are definitely a few, but not enough to worry about.

And the key to this whole thing working is that the ATF has to approve the sale of the software for it to be valid to use. So, in order to approve the software, the ATF requires the source code to be provided to them. They may not need the whole source code but will definitely require at least the data file structure to be reviewed, along with some other technical data. The next assumption is not about you or anything you control, but about the ATF. Assume they are corrupt enough to do something that is against the law, such as collect a database of gun owners. This is actually more of a proven fact than an assumption, IMO. So, suppose a corrupt ATF announces they are accepting software to review. After they receive it, they tell the publisher that it will not be approved unless he puts certain functionality in it AND he does not tell anyone it is there. The secret function is a file transfer of data to the ATF of all sales made in the previous 24 hours.

And that is how it could be done.

The problem with this is that I am a big believer in the old motto of three can keep a secret only if two of them are dead. This is the flaw with most conspiracy theories. But then you run into things like the JFK assassination where the public story has been told (and is probably true) and anything else is considered a conspiracy theory but the government is still keeping some of the records on this top secret 60 years after the fact. That makes me think there is something in the files that the public should know and that we don't. And that something could only be that the publicly released story is not true.

So, it is possible to do this, but it is not likely to be happening.

[mayor]

My grandmother told me: "Believe none of what you hear and only half of what you see." I don't believe anything I hear from government and I don't believe anything I see from the government.

[mrvmax]

What I am stating, whether major retailer like Buds or small fish like me, PC’s, servers, routers whatever, are not connected in any way to the ATF. So, the only way the government can access is by illegally hacking into it. Could that be done? Of course, but illegal hacking by our government is a whole different issue that I’m sure FFL’s are not taking into consideration with their software.