Skip to Content
Silicon Valley

Facebook blocks the sharing of 3-D printable firearm models on its platform

August 9, 2018

According to Buzzfeed News, the social network is restricting the sharing of links to web pages that host instructions for creating 3-D printed weapons.

Some background: Earlier this month a US federal judge in Seattle ruled to block the posting of digital plans for DIY guns. In response, the plans were taken off of Defcad.com, the primary location where the files were hosted. However, some sites like CodeIsFreeSpeech.com have kept them online.

Facebook’s response: Last week some Facebook and Instagram users began getting error messages when attempting to share links to CodeIsFreeSpeech.com and other web pages providing the information. The social network has now revealed an official ban. In a statement, the company said, “Sharing instructions on how to print firearms using 3D printers is not allowed under our Community Standards. In line with our policies, we are removing this content from Facebook.”

What’s next: Without providing much detail, a Facebook spokesperson told Buzzfeed that it’s exploring options to more strictly enforce the ban on spreading the 3-D printable models on its platform. The dispute over their legality is far from over, too. A follow-up hearing regarding the judge’s ruling will be held tomorrow.

Keep Reading

Most Popular

The inside story of how ChatGPT was built from the people who made it

Exclusive conversations that take us behind the scenes of a cultural phenomenon.

How Rust went from a side project to the world’s most-loved programming language

For decades, coders wrote critical systems in C and C++. Now they turn to Rust.

Design thinking was supposed to fix the world. Where did it go wrong?

An approach that promised to democratize design may have done the opposite.

Sam Altman invested $180 million into a company trying to delay death

Can anti-aging breakthroughs add 10 healthy years to the human life span? The CEO of OpenAI is paying to find out.

Stay connected

Illustration by Rose Wong

Get the latest updates from
MIT Technology Review

Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.

Thank you for submitting your email!

Explore more newsletters

It looks like something went wrong.

We’re having trouble saving your preferences. Try refreshing this page and updating them one more time. If you continue to get this message, reach out to us at customer-service@technologyreview.com with a list of newsletters you’d like to receive.