James Bond meets Samuel Colt: Seeking to build a safer gun
Mossberg already has spent more than a decade working to develop — and someday bring to the market — a firearm that the wrong person cannot fire.
Mossberg's iGun Technology Corp., based in Daytona Beach, Florida, relies on a simple piece of jewelry — a ring — that "talks" to a circuit board imbedded in a firearm to let it know the user is authorized.
Initial efforts encountered a public wary of the technology, but that has eased as iPhones, tablets and other smart devices have become common.
Some rely on radio-frequency identification, or RFID, technology, proximity sensors similar to the system Mossberg's company uses.
On Friday, Obama announced new steps to curb gun violence, including by identifying the requirements "smart guns" would have to meet for law enforcement agencies to buy and use them.
"The technologies are a reality now," said Stephen Teret, a professor of health policy and management at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health who studies gun violence and gun policies.
"If you need it to protect yourself and it doesn't work, that's a bad outcome," said Larry Keane, senior vice president and general counsel for the National Shooting Sports Foundation, which represents manufacturers.
[...] as personalized technology won greater acceptance — and after mass shootings in Columbine, Colorado; Newtown, Connecticut, and other places seized public attention — opposition faded.