US government orders removal of 3D-gun designs

Well this didn't take long.  Per the announcment the first (known) version of a 3D Printed gun has been posted on the Internet and much like Pandoras box, once its opened, it cannot be closed.

The order to remove the blueprints for the plastic gun comes after they were downloaded more than 100,000 times.

The US State Department wrote to the gun's designer, Defense Distributed, suggesting publishing them online may breach arms-control regulations.

Although the files have been removed from the company's Defcad site, it is not clear whether this will stop people accessing the blueprints.

They were being hosted by the Mega online service and may still reside on its servers.

Also, many links to copies of the blueprints have been uploaded to file-sharing site the Pirate Bay, making them widely available. The Pirate Bay has also publicised its links to the files via social news site Reddit suggesting many more people will get hold of the blueprints.

I wouldn't worry too much about reddit, unless it's an animated .gif or a meme people are less inclined to care however, having the file out on torrent sites means anyone can get a copy.

Related Web URL: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22478310