World's Safest Gun

Kai Kloepfer, an 18-year-old inventor from Boulder, Colorado, has developed a biometric sensor designed to prevent unauthorized people from firing guns. His sensor, when installed on a plastic model of a Beretta Px4, uses stored fingerprints to tell which authorized user is holding a gun and to prevent unauthorized users from firing it. In tests, the sensor worked 99.99 percent of the time. When the gun is picked up, it automatically scans the user’s fingerprint, and if it doesn’t match, the trigger locks. Klopfer said: “I’ve been interested in technology for as long as I can remember. After the mass shooting in the movie theater in Aurora in 2012, I started thinking about the role technology could play in preventing accidents and death related to firearms. The idea actually came to me in a dream and I have been working since then to make it a reality.” Continue reading for three videos and more information.

Using a $50,000 grant from the Smart Tech Challenges Foundation, Kloepfer is working on transferring the sensor to a real gun and move toward market-scale production. His comes as part of the Smart Tech for Firearms Challenge, aimed at improving firearm safety by furthering innovation around personalization features in firearms, locking devices and ammunition systems in order to reduce gun tragedies.

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A technology, gadget and video game enthusiast that loves covering the latest industry news. Favorite trade show? Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.