Defense Distributed is an online, open-source hardware and software organization that develops digital schematics of firearms in CAD files, or "wiki weapons", that may be downloaded from the Internet and used in 3D printing or CNC milling applications.

[2] Among the organization's goals is to develop and freely publish firearms-related design schematics that can be downloaded and reproduced by anyone with a 3D printer or milling machine, facilitating the popular production of homemade firearms.

[14][better source needed] Multiple federal and state lawsuits are pending which challenge the legality and of this settlement, and the protected speech content of 3D printable gun files.

After raising US$2,000 via a suspended crowd-funding appeal, suffering the confiscation of its first 3D printer, and partnering with private manufacturing firms,[15] the organization began live fire testing of the first generation of printable firearms in December 2012.

[25][15] The organization's motivations have been described as "less about [a] gun... than about democratizing manufacturing technology,"[26] In an interview with Slashdot, Cody Wilson described the Wiki Weapon project as a chance to "experiment with Enlightenment ideas… to literally materialize freedom.

[39] Learning of Defense Distributed's plans in 2012, manufacturer Stratasys, Ltd threatened legal action and demanded the return of the 3D printer it had leased to Wilson.

[46][47] On May 6, 2015, Defense Distributed filed a Constitutional challenge against the State Department in the Western District of Texas, suing agents of the DDTC and accusing the federal government of knowingly violating the company's First, Second, and Fifth amendment liberties.

[48][49] After three years of procedural wrangling, on July 10, 2018, Wired magazine reported Defense Distributed and SAF had accepted a settlement offer from the Department of State.

[58][59] On April 27, 2021, however, the Ninth Circuit vacated an injunction in a related case, holding that Congress had expressly prohibited judicial review of the agency decisions in question.

[65] In late 2022, Defense Distributed, joined by the Second Amendment Foundation, intervened in VanDerStok v. Garland, a suit challenging the ATF's 2021 "Frame or Receiver" rule, ATF2021R-05F.

[68][8][9] The files remain available on mirror websites, Twitter, Reddit, Thingiverse, and GitHub, and have been downloaded millions of times on Odysee and via peer-to-peer torrent services.

[71][72] Open-source software advocate Eric S. Raymond has endorsed the organization and its efforts, calling Defense Distributed "friends of freedom" and writing "I approve of any development that makes it more difficult for governments and criminals to monopolize the use of force.

[76][77] However, critics have also noted that Defense Distributed has merely offered the means of production back to the masses in a way not too dissimilar from the effect the printing press had on the spread of information and the decentralization of power in societies.