Website with searchable database of NY pistol permit holders

[Woodstock]

About 20 years ago the Springfield Republican published the names and addresses of all the FFL holders in western MA. No problem for the big stores, but a lot of the smaller guys, competitive shooters, part-time gunsmiths, etc. were outed and very unhappy. Can't blame them. That list was incomplete and out of date, too.

 

[twogunwilly]

The liberal rag located in Warren county wanted to publish a list of permit holders last year but were not allowed to (for some reason) they claimed it was freedom of info and really pissed off alot of readers.

 

[LoginName]

And no, you can't get non-resident permits any more. One judge used to issue NY permits by mail, however, the county law department issued an opinion that he lacked the jurisdictional authority to do so and all permits he issued to non-residents were allowed to expire and not eligible for renewal (fortunately, they were not revoked). Too bad .... the application even had a "check if Canadian" box on the form, and lots Toronto area folks had NY carry permits. And no, this judge did not restrict the permits (but they were upstate "Not valid in NYC" permits)

Examples like that and the following probably had something to do with the decision to not issue anymore non-resident permits...

Janie's Got A Gun Permit? Aerosmith Flap Lands Cop In Hot Water
NYPD officer allegedly gave bandmembers permit in exchange for favors.

By Jon Wiederhorn

After hooking up Aerosmith's Steven Tyler and Joe Perry with licenses to carry guns, the head of the NYPD's License Division has been reassigned to a desk job in the Intelligence Division because he may have illegally provided the permits.

Inspector Bernard Petrofsky is reportedly under investigation for giving the bandmembers the licenses in exchange for a concert ticket, backstage pass and limo ride to a post-concert party. Police refused to comment on the case, and Petrofsky did not return phone calls.

The controversy stems from an incident in November 2001, when the musicians requested gun carry permits from the NYPD to protect them against stalkers. New York law requires people seeking such permits to appear at police headquarters and explain why they should be granted a license. Applicants who carry large amounts of money, work in hazardous jobs or have been subjected to credible threats are often the most credible candidates.

However, Aerosmith allegedly avoided the standard protocol by having Petrofsky and another officer travel to Madison Square Garden to fingerprint the bandmembers before a concert. Soon after, Tyler and Perry were granted the gun permits.

http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1459226/20021219/aerosmith.jhtml

This is very far from accurate. I checked a few people I know in upstate and they were not in there. I listed by town and it too was missing many people.

The website owner even admits the inaccuracies...

In fact, the database is riddled with errors, omissions, and some outright garbage, and in some cases may not match local records.

I suspect that like many other municipal/state run databases, there are bound to be problems and screw-ups... some worse than others; as an example, our very own FA-10 record keeping system.

Regardless... the privacy concerns still remain.

About 20 years ago the Springfield Republican published the names and addresses of all the FFL holders in western MA. No problem for the big stores, but a lot of the smaller guys, competitive shooters, part-time gunsmiths, etc. were outed and very unhappy. Can't blame them. That list was incomplete and out of date, too.

I believe that was when it was still possible to obtain a "kitchen table" FFL/dealers license.

A listing of current FFLs (by state and license type) is available here,...

http://www.atf.gov/about/foia/ffl-list.html

 

[namedpipes]

If the state is going to license something then that info should be public. Best thing would be to have no state permits them it isn't an issue. None of a state's business dealings should be hidden. Lots of things the state has no business in...

Just because you do business with ME doesn't give ME the right to run a 1/4 page ad in the paper saying you did and what you bought/sold, which of your kids were there etc.

Just because I had some random transaction with the state doesn't give THEM to right to publish THAT, either...

This is very far from accurate. I checked a few people I know in upstate and they were not in there.

Very surprised none of the Teutles have permits. I know there was one episode where they went skeet shooting!

Anywho, taking the first 7k or 8k records, geocoding the addresses and rendering a map is kind of interesting. I'm not interested enough to process the whole list but it would certainly outline the "safe" areas to be a burglar, eh? And the areas where people have plenty to guard, too...

Interesting distribution. Why do Albanites and Rochesterians have more guns than people in Franklinville?

And why are they issuing licenses in China?!

 

[eisenhow]

Very surprised none of the Teutles have permits. I know there was one episode where they went skeet shooting!

Long guns don't require any permit/license in NYS

 

[Climbnsink]

It is not private business it is government licensing. I don't think there should be government licensing of firearms, but I also think gov't issued licenses/contracts should be public. Asking to be off the record for 'safety' is a slippery slope. Anxiety is the price of freedom. First gun permits holders then who? The looters getting National Endowment for the Arts money- gotta stay safe from them teabaggers. Sunshine for all gov't business, that is if we can't get the gov't out of people's business.

Just because you do business with ME doesn't give ME the right to run a 1/4 page ad in the paper saying you did and what you bought/sold, which of your kids were there etc.

Just because I had some random transaction with the state doesn't give THEM to right to publish THAT, either...

 

[Rob Boudrie]

A listing of current FFLs (by state and license type) is available here,...

http://www.atf.gov/about/foia/ffl-list.html

The ATF has a database that is continuously updated you can fetch using an http/https get (I forget which), provided you supply an FFL number to do so. This will get you a more up 2 date list than this monthly posting by the BATFE.

The downloadable lists from the BATFE contain the FFL number (broken down to fields, but they are there). I can provide the perl script I wrote to fetch this into a local MySQL database to anyone who wants it, however, I am not offering to help debug your installation process. I am certain it works since one of my systems does a new fetch at about 3AM every day.

And why are they issuing licenses in China?!

This list is way out of date. My guess is that many of the non-NY addresses are for people who got their license before Judge Cass stopped issuing non-resident permits - although there may still be some situations where "special" people have been taken care of.

 

[RichM]

I called my brother late last night to tell him the good news... fortunately they have his old address.... not that that'll stop anybody from looking at the RMV database for curent addresses...

He said they were talking about this on the local talk radio station today...

BTW, Tennessee has a similar database:

http://www.commercialappeal.com/data/gunpermits/ found on the Tennessee Gun Owners site.

 

[the_doctor]

Everyone knows that Stern carries. I think that it was even mentioned by him on 60 minutes.

 

[TomH]

I don't think there should be government licensing of firearms, but I also think gov't issued licenses/contracts should be public.

I agree, the real problem is the fact there is a licensing system to exercise a right in the first place. Two wrongs don't make a right.

 

[calsdad]

Has there ever been any verifiable bad consequences from the publishing of these databases? I am thinking about that woman who was trying to stay away from the abusive ex and now had to move again - or - home breakins where it appeared the person was targeted because it was a known thing they had guns.

Seems like there would be grounds for a lawsuit there if so. Maybe not against the state - but if you spend any time reading the news it seems like a good lawyer could come up with a reason to sue just about anybody. I can't see why the person who published the website couldn't be sued for some reason or another. Especially if somebody suffered because the website made it easier to track a person down.

 

[Titan]

Don Imus is listed (Imus, John D).

Perhaps he and stern are armed to protect themselves from each other.


I wonder if William M O'Reilly is 'Bill O'Reilly'.

 

[drgrant]

I sent this along to a friend who lives in New York. His name and address is on the list.
My son's name is not on the list. He's a cop in New York City. Hopefully they will at least keep LEO names and addresses protected.

Depending on the laws LEOs might be blanket exempt, and not require a permit. Not sure if that is the case in NY or not. This might be especially true if your son owns no handguns beyond whatever he was issued. (not sure if this is the case or not). In MA LEO's do not need an LTC to keep guns, either... but they can't buy guns or ammo without it.

-Mike

 

[terraformer]

Depending on the laws LEOs might be blanket exempt, and not require a permit. Not sure if that is the case in NY or not.

-Mike

They wouldn't be able to purchase without it so they would be limited to whatever their provided duty weapon was. NYPD and MTA transit used to prohibit off duty carry at one point but that was lifted after a series of active shooter situations like the LIRR gunman. To the point that I believe NYC and MTA cops get free rides on mass transit now (that may even be out of uniform). I don't know if they are allowed to carry something other than their duty gun when off hours, but if they are, then the only way they could get something different would be to buy it themselves.

 

[drgrant]

Has there ever been any verifiable bad consequences from the publishing of these databases? I am thinking about that woman who was trying to stay away from the abusive ex and now had to move again - or - home breakins where it appeared the person was targeted because it was a known thing they had guns.

I wouldn't be surprised if there was, but it would be too hard to track in a lot of cases, unless all the info was revealed post-incident. It's kind of the same problem as tracking people who have been effectively killed by gun laws. (EG, I'm pretty sure the number of people killed in MA as an indirect result of being unable to obtain a firearm in a reasonable amount of time is a non-zero number. These victims probably run the gamut from DV victims to people who simply had enemies for whatever reason or another. ) Nobody out there is really tracking the data, or at least the people best in position to collect it (eg, the PD investigators or the court systems) aren't bothering.

-Mike

 

[GSG]

Just because I had some random transaction with the state doesn't give THEM to right to publish THAT, either...

Agreed. Does anyone remember why DMV records aren't public in CA anymore? Her name was Rebecca Schaeffer.

Asking to be off the record for 'safety' is a slippery slope.

We're at the point where rights are taxed, licensed, interfered with and completely obliterated in some areas. How much slippery-er could this slope get?

Has there ever been any verifiable bad consequences from the publishing of these databases? I am thinking about that woman who was trying to stay away from the abusive ex and now had to move again - or - home breakins where it appeared the person was targeted because it was a known thing they had guns.

Yes, even from databases not published publicly.

http://www.bcrevolution.ca/stealing_your_guns.htm

But the real concern is what a criminal mind would do with a shopping list of guns in Canada, John Hicks, an information technology consultant in Orillia, told The Packet & Times yesterday.

"If this were Amazon, Visa, or EBay, they'd be bankrupt," Hicks said. "I have worked with 13-year-old kids who can break into this system."

I found some dead links at the below website, maybe someone else can find some live ones.

http://freebritannia.6.forumer.com/viewtopic.php?p=7845&sid=c644bde5b8d3a636bbc95cf3c523e257

...Our own Mark Bonokoski, who has diligently covered a disturbing number of recent stories involving legitimate gun owners having their legally stored weapons stolen, offered a devastating argument that the nearly $2-billion registry itself could actually be contributing to these crimes.

Citing numerous examples of breaches of the federal government's other (supposedly) secure databases -- the RCMP-administered CPIC system; even top secret defence department security computers -- Bono argued that the bungle-plagued gun registry is just as vulnerable.

Proving the point, he quoted former firearms registry webmaster John Hicks, who says he reported flaws in the system to his superiors: "It took some $15 million to develop it, and I broke into it in about 30 minutes," said Hicks. "A 16-year-old kid could have broken into that system in a heartbeat.".

Sophisticated computer hacking aside, Bono has also reported how would-be thieves can track gun owners through ammunition sales records kept by retail stores, or other means. But most registry proponents prefer to ignore these troubles and blame the victim -- gun owners who've been burgled -- while demanding laws to ban all innocent people from owning guns...

and

A fortnight ago, and in the wake of another calculated but seemingly out-of-the-blue robbery of a registered gun collector, even the Toronto Star finally entertained the possibility that the national gun registry might have been compromised and that sensitive information might have leaked to criminals.

Trouble is, this is hardly cutting-edge news.

Legitimate gun owners -- including cops and ex-cops who are shooting club enthusiasts -- have been publicly pointing their finger at the Canadian Firearms Centre registry, particularly since its database is linked to the Canadian Police Information Centre (CPIC), the all-things-criminal computer operated by the RCMP under the stewardship of National Police Services.

There are, of course, the usual suspects who will quickly deep-six such a notion, among them Wendy Cukier, president of the Coalition for Gun Control, who maintains gun collectors either talk too much or are followed home from the gun clubs to which they belong.

...

If there are still doubters, however, then perhaps those doubters should make their way to the website of the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters.

In their April hotline, the organization tells the story of former firearm registry webmaster John Hicks -- who has never owned a gun -- who warned authorities that the supposedly impregnable registry site was an easy target.

"It took some $15 million to develop it, and I broke into it in about 30 minutes," he said, indicating he warned his superiors repeatedly before resorting to filing an official complaint with the privacy commissioner.

"Basically, a 16-year-old kid could have broken into that system in a heartbeat."

The stories show up when searched, but for whatever reason the links aren't live, probably because Canadian gun owners are tired of having their stuff stolen and don't want the info out there anymore.

I can't see why the person who published the website couldn't be sued for some reason or another.

People bring forward BS lawsuits all the time. Getting one to stick & shut down the website would be the important thing here.

To the point that I believe NYC and MTA cops get free rides on mass transit now (that may even be out of uniform). I don't know if they are allowed to carry something other than their duty gun when off hours, but if they are, then the only way they could get something different would be to buy it themselves.

Last I heard, they ride transit free in uniform so that their presence acts as a deterrant (), and lots of NYPD carry non-issued guns off duty, they have to choose from a very limited list of approved firearms though. I don't think MTA merged with NYPD when the other 4 did though, so I have no idea what their policy is.

 

[Dr_Scholl]

We had something similar here a few years a go where the Roanoke Times had an online database of CCW holders. There was so much public outrage they pulled it after one day. The General Assembly passed a law blocking access of the database to the public the next session.

 

[glockstones]

It's funny to me that because we are gun owners we have absolutly no rights.............but if you tried to post a list of say all the illegal immigrants or maybe try and get them to register themselves like a fire arm that would be an absolute infringrment on thier civil rights......