Parkland shooting spurs information age solutions for gun violence Big data already knows everything about us, so couldn't it have stopped Nikolas Cruz's Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School slaughter in Parkland?

Charlie Kirk and John Chachas | Opinion contributors

Show Caption Hide Caption Timeline of deadly Parkland HS shooting Newly-released surveillance video gives a glimpse of how police responded during the deadly shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is examining the response of all officers in the case.

When you call your favorite Chinese take-out today you usually are addressed by name; asked if you have the same address when you placed your last order in November and if you want "the usual with extra soy sauce and four spring rolls?" Similar questions from your favorite pizza joint. When you dial into your airline from your mobile phone, the automated system asks, “Welcome back, John, where are you traveling today?”

Virtually every piece of your personal, health, financial and travel data, even beer preferences are available to somebody somewhere. So much for the individual right of privacy and personal freedom, the erosion of which essentially began in 1946 with the invention of the ENIAC computer.

And given the national gun debate raging in America with all manner of suggestions such as armed teachers, metal detectors in schools and churches — can metal detectors and armed guards at McDonald’s be far behind? — it is time for Congress to move into the 21st century and require the harnessing of integrated data to better equip American law enforcement.

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"Gun registration!" will be the angry outcry from our friends at the National Rifle Association, but this proposal is about purchases not lawful owners.

We are both lifelong conservative Republicans and gun owners. We live in a remarkable age of information and in the interest of young people, we need to turn the national conversation to procedures that might have helped avert recent tragedies.

We are neither gun proponents, nor gun control zealots.

Having said that we must allow authorities to have available knowledge about excess purchases of weapons and ammunition; knowledge about persons with mental illness or at-risk behavior; and the intersection of these categories in a manner that offers tools for law enforcement to intervene.

The Chinese take-out, the pizza restaurant, airlines, the credit card companies, Google, Amazon, iTunes and every other American enterprise has moved forward voluntarily utilizing such data.

It is now time for Congress and policy makers to retire the worthless empty phrase “common sense gun laws” and equally worthless “Gun Show Loophole” and actually pass meaningful legislation. Millennials and kids are at risk so enough of the vapid talk.

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We offer the following proposal:

► Establish a central data base at the FBI and Department of Homeland Security for future gun purchases to take effect upon enactment of legislation.

► The statute would mandate that before the purchase of any gun or ammunition, the buyer must present a valid state driver's license or a U.S. passport and a social security number. Furthermore, every purchase must be by credit card — not by cash or trade-in.

► Any party that purchases more than one gun or three 24-round boxes of ammunition within the same calendar week will be flagged by the database for further review.

► Flagged buyers shall, following further review, be subject to additional data scrutiny including readily available public information on traffic violations, reports of domestic violence, public intoxication from drugs or alcohol, postings on social media, obituary notices, employment terminations and the like. This additional review will be established by the FBI and Homeland Security with appropriate help from Silicon Valley creating a "risk scoring" of data associated with flagged persons.

► Cross references will highlight concerns raised about a person's health status, treatment or behavior combined with flags for multiple purchases of firearms or ammunition.

For those who call this a slippery slope we offer the tragic images of families burying their children. The use of such information already in the public domain could prevent the next Nikolas Cruz from purchasing weapons. Is that not a worthy use of information already readily available?

We stand with students from the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas School in Florida. It’s long past time to do something. A Republican Congress should pass such legislation and send it to the president for his signature.

Charlie Kirk is the founder and executive director of Turning Point USA, a political advocacy group focused on promoting conservative policies among Millennials. John Chachas is a senior advisor to Turning Point and managing partner of Methuselah Advisors, a New York-based investment bank.