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3D-printed weapons are a future threat: 'In general, it's a race against time when new technologies are invented' | India | DR An increasing number of 3D-printed weapons are being seized around Europe, Europol reports. With a 3D printer, you can produce everything from medical equipment to glasses, jewelry, toys and small machine parts. weapons, and this is a risk that the European Police Authority is increasingly focusing on. In general, it is a race against time when new technologies are invented, because it places higher demands on the legislation and its enforcement. .Nicolas Padfield, laboratory manager at FabLab at RUCFor while the production of was once reserved for established weapon manufacturers, anyone with access to a 3D printer today can in principle produce their own weapon. This has actually been the case for a number of years in the USA 3D printing of a weapon was introduced nine years ago. In recent years, it has also branched out into Europe, where the police in countries such as Spain, Germany and the United Kingdom have been able to detect crime. In Halle in Germany, a perpetrator in 2019 killed two people with a 3D-printed, and the police in Sweden, Spain, Japan and the UK have 3D-printed in the last couple According to the European Police Authority, 3D printing of weapons is a new and growing threat in Europe. For the same reason, 3D printing of weapons was on the agenda this week, where together with the national Dutch police has held an international conference in the Dutch city of The Hague to discuss the problem.- Developments in 3D printing weapons are a current and future threat. International cooperation is therefore, in order to counteract it, said Gerda van Leeuwen, Chief of Staff of the Dutch National Police, at the opening of the conference, according to Nicolas Padfield, laboratory manager at FabLab, an open prototype workshop, is skeptical about where big a threat it is at the moment.- However, I am somewhat skeptical about the real risk of 3D-printed weapons, because "The Liberator", the first American version of a 3D-printed, was a terribly bad weapon that exploded in the hand of you half the time.- In other words, it is really inefficient, and an ordinary lathe in an auto repair shop will always be a better place to produce one, says Nicolas Padfield. But still he can easily see the sense in , for example, focuses on 3D-printed.- In general, it is a race against time when new technologies are invented, because it places higher demands on the legislation, and its enforcement, to keep up .- For me to see the biggest new risk with 3D printed weapons is that they are made of plastic and therefore are harder to detect. You can do this in airports, for example, where you scan X-rays of bags, but elsewhere, for example in the USA, you use them to a great extent that cannot catch weapons made of plastic, says Nicolas Padfield. 3D-printed are dangerous. Both because they can fire shots, but especially because there is also a high risk of the weapon exploding in the hand during firing. According to Nicolas Padfield, it is therefore not an obvious weapon for perpetrators.- You can 3D print weapons, but it is and will be an unsuitable medium for weapon production, because you print in plastic, and it is not a very strong material.- There where there is cause for concern is that within the next decades we will refine the technique and be able to 3D print everything, even things that are far more dangerous than a gun, says Nicolas Padfield.He says that it is already possible to 3D print in stronger materials such as metal, which the US military does, but it is still so expensive that it does not make sense to the individual. Nicolas Padfield, however, expects the price to fall in the long run.- New technologies always offer new opportunities. Yes, someone will abuse it, but the benefits of 3D printing far outweigh the risk that someone will abuse it. The chance that someone will use the technology for something good is far greater than the risk, says Nicolas Padfield.