"Smart" (biometric) ammunition magazines (courtesy bloomberg .com)

Needless to say, this could be a “What Could Possibly Go Wrong?” post. I’d love to see a demo video of a gun owner reloading his handgun using the system. Under stress. Tap, rack, look at the idiot light! Hey! Look at the new round count! bloomberg.com reveals the man behind the biometric mags: 52-year-old Daniel Biran. The Co-founder of two-year-old, 15-employee startup Clipfort in Kfar Saba, Israel “previously made biometric memory sticks [and] began working on gun safety following the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre.” Here’s some more ammo for biometric mag haters . . .

1. Lock
The fingerprint sensor on the bottom of the clip is programmed at purchase to match the owner’s print. It works 99,999 times out of 100,000, the company says.

Good luck with that! (courtesy bloomberg.org)

2. Load
ID confirmation takes 0.7 seconds. Given a match, the clip can load bullets until the magazine is removed from the gun.

Prototypes
Clipfort has developed magazines for the M16 rifle and a range of pistols.

Price
The company says it plans to charge $150 to $200 for the clips, which can be refilled with new bullets.

Next Steps
Clipfort has joined with gun manufacturer Check-Mate Industries to begin mass production by the end of next year.

Just in case you thought this was a REALLY stupid idea, Bloomberg called an “expert” to tout the biometric mag concept. Even he couldn’t quite see its commercial potential.

Adam Winkler, a UCLA law professor and author of Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America, says that even though Clipfort has strenuously avoided taking a position on U.S. gun laws, “many gun enthusiasts will see this as a back door to restricting their Second Amendment rights”—and pressure retailers to keep the magazines off their shelves.

Yeah, that’s it. Blame gun enthusiasts for rejecting this lame-ass concept – before it even hits the stores. What’s really hard to believe: Biran burned through $2m already and wants another million to make it so – assuming his calls to Michael Bloomberg went unanswered,

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74 COMMENTS

  4. He’s not looking for ANOTHER million… He’s looking for another FOUR million. DOUBLE what ‘investors’ have already ponied up. Good luck with that…

  5. These articles are what happens when idiots that know nothing about the topic write articles about guns.

    They neglect to mention that real reason gun owners won’t want it. Because it is more than 3-4 times the cost of a new magazine, the implications for gun control and unreliability are just icing on the cake.

    • As per cost of these being prohibitive, you might check some of the prices of “junky” mags made by ruger, savage, etc. some close to $100 (with no finger print thingy included), same for the (better) AI, SIG rifle mags…which MagPul recently challenged with reasonably priced models, so all other features ignored, these mag prices are not that crazy.

      • The most expensive Ruger mag is a 10rd .308 for the Scout rifle, $75. That’s still 2-3 times less than this biometric mag, and I don’t consider 75 bucks even remotely “close to $100.” The overwhelming majority of magazines are 4-6 times cheaper.

      • Oh believe me I am aware of some very expensive magazines. I’ve paid $160 plus shipping for 171.25mm STI 9mm magazines, I have a belt full of magazines that cost more than many people’s pistols.

        But if these are $200 for a Glock magazine, that $160 STI mag would probably be over $300 with this technology.

  8. If you are not sure of the difference between a clip and a magazine you should not be designing either.

    • whoa Whoa whoa you mean you’re supposed to know about a subject before designing a product for it…. mind blown

  10. So I has my “Smart Mag” and there is a lonely regular mag sitting there. Unless it is a part of the firearm, and the pistol / rifle will not fire until it is paired up. It is USELESS, stopping a shooter who wants to kill people.

    Maybe we need a smart chip inserted into politicos brains, and Bloomies homies, like Watts, Moveon (away from logic) it must be used anytime they open there mouths.

    As Fri the 13th has shown. You cannot stop someone who uses violence without violence. If you want to rush in and tackle a shooter unarmed you are still engaging in a violent action. The only non violent action is to stand in the way and allow yourself to be shot in place of someone else. Ain’t many who would do so.

    As long as there are sheep there will always be wolves. Never seen a Wolf Free Zone sign.

  11. Hey, this is a great idea! I can’t wait until it’s beta tested by 35,000 members of the NYPD, and also Obama’s praetorian guards from the Secret Service.

  12. Do you have to put your finger to it for each round? No? Then if you lose your loaded gun in a tussle the bad guy can still use it on you? And any other mags you have that he can take? $200 for that? Yeah, folks would be lining up for that, but for those nasty “gun enthusiasts” and their “pressure”.

    • Well, with CO2 guns you just load the bullet’s

      So it must be a CO2 pistol.

      But with CO2 “clips” are still called “magazines”

  18. On top of all the other issues with this system, is the capacity for the Glock 19 variant only six rounds? Just guessing by the picture.

  19. Any investor willing to dump cash on projects like these has no idea what due diligence means. The only customers i could foresee are FUDDs and new gun owners introduced by fudds. If u got the cash to invest in this please come to my office and i’ll make sure u make 45.70% of a return on every penny u put into my funds. And u wont find where i keep my disclaimer.

  21. “Revealed”? Didn’t TTAG already cover this terrible product idea several months ago? I’m pretty sure I recall us eviscerating the concept in the comments section already.

  22. “Works 99,999 times out of 100,000”.

    Under lab conditions, almost certainly. I want to see it tested with sweat, blood, mud, whatever.

    And the counter is totally in the wrong place — if I’m going to have a display telling me how many shots I have left, I want it where I don’t have to take my eyes off my target.

  24. None of this technology is “smart”. Computers are not smart. They do an excellent job of matching up digital files and running digital programs MOST of the time. They also screw up a lot and have many software issues and hacking concerns. To put these systems on a device that needs to be accessed and used in a second or less with no glitches or delays is asanine, dangerous and potentially criminal. They are a lawsuit waiting to happen when one of these fails in a self defense situation. Any lawmaker that advocates devices like this needs to be voted out of office for being stupid or gullible.

  25. I’m still waiting in the 9mm exacto round that only hit targets that have bad intentions.

    Hey I need about 12 million to fund the R&D on my innovative new flying lawnmower.

      • I learned that term when in college. I was on a rafting trip down the river once when the campus ROTC helicopter came along low enough to hit with a paddle. I talked to an ROTC buddy later and he said a former Vietnam chopper pilot was there showing what could be done with a helicopter.

    • Don’t question it.
      It’s a “smart feature”.
      Gun owners aren’t trained or smart
      enough to understand liberal writing or logic.

    • You’re being deliberately obtuse. Clearly this wonderful device, once paired with your fingerprint, will continue to load bullets until you remove it from the gun. That ability could save you the cost of the magazine on the first day. Pair it up, fire 500-1000 rounds, and when you’re ready to go home remove it! You’ve saved $2-300 in ammo with most calibers, and it can even be reloaded for tomorrow!

  27. What is that Glock-looking gun in this photo? It just looks different enough to obviously not actually be a Glock.

    • It’s the Smart-Glock, the SMOCK. Just don’t take it out when it’s raining or expect it to work quickly.

  29. “Clipfort” now replaces the term derp to mean retard.

    “Hey clipfort your shoe is untied.”

    “Nice airball clipfort, aim for the rim next time.”

  30. No thanks, to the annoying nosy Jewish Grandmas’ overbearing urges satiating crapola ‘inventions.’

    LOL

  32. Biometric authentication is the absolute worst method, period. To implement it for anything even resembling life or death situations is pretty laughable, if its not due to cluelessness then maybe this was chosen for subversive reasons.

  33. Once again, edit time was expired by the time the edit screen came up. About 20 seconds.

    Then, posting this, “you are posting too quickly. Slow down.”

    This is entirely unacceptable. Who would accept such performance from a firearm?

  34. The only “smart tech” gun owners will likely ever accept will be for those trailer hitch and cooler locks they give you with your purchase.

  37. An extra .7 of a second probably doesn’t seem like a big deal to a lot of people, but that is a serious disadvantage in a fight.

  38. Isn’t Checkmate a current USGI contractor for M14 and M16/M4 mags? And not the best rep either. They need a good reaming for being associated with this product. Don’t reward them with your hard earned dollars, make them feel it.

  40. It works “99,999 out of 100,000 times” they claim…

    I seriously doubt they tested it with somebody who has undergone a simulated violent attack – their hands would be shaking uncontrollably and they may have blood covering their fingerprints.

    • I just tested my phone’s sensor, which is similar if not identical tech. I quickly tapped my finger on my tongue and tried to unlock the phone. No-go with a tiny amount of transparent liquid. I had to wipe the sensor and use my other finger to get it to work again. I wouldn’t want to test blood because it would stain the sensor and require real cleaning, exactly what you don’t want in a life-or-death situation.

  41. Hey, it’s fashionable to be a tech “entrepreneur” these days. If you’re too much of an idiot to do anything useful, what’s wrong with useless. Plenty of equally too much of an idiot rich apes (cough, Major Dunce in NY) wishing to be able to brag about being an “angel” investor.

  42. My new phone, the LG V10, has a “biometric” scanner (aka fingerprint scanner) that’s supposed to be 99.9% effective as well. That’s to say it’s 99.9% effective when I have the perfect finger placement under optimal conditions. That means far less than 99.9% success rate. Under battlefield conditions with added stress no way it would work. It is pretty cool on my phone, but I wouldn’t trust my life to it and then add the two seconds of racking a slide. Then there is the issue of taking a carry gun you can conceal and taking away the concealability.

    Considering the anti-police movement going on now they should be the first to test these in the US. Exempt status, what’s that?

  43. “…and pressure retailers to keep the magazines off their shelves….” The pressure will be that they won’t sell.

    I’d hate to really need a magazine and it be that one time out of 100,000 where it doesn’t work.

  44. Perhaps, someday, the right combination of ingenuity and technology will make one that’s foolproof and reliable: both error free and failure free. Until then it is quite literally bleeding edge technology. I won’t condemn them for trying because these imperfect attempts are essential to finally arriving at something that people who depend on their guns for their lives and safety can rely on. But for now I have no plans to bleed unnecessarily because of an experimental, imperfect approach fails me. I’ll let others do that.

  45. A glock mag runs about 30 bucks. 150 to 200 bucks is outrageous!

    Also, you’ll need to take it apart and clean it. If this is possible, you could easily remove the electronic mechanism. It takes its place next to those pinned magazines in Canada, where it’s illegal to remove the pins (The pin obstructs the follower, making a 30 round magazine a 5 round magazine). I’m sure criminals will pay attention to that. Murder is a crime too, you know.

    Lastly, 0.7 seconds is a long f***ing time in a tactical reload.

  47. I think I will just wait for “Smart Rounds.” You know, ammunition that will only kill bad guys! LOL

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