Since the launch the fingerprint sensor in iPhone 5S and 5C we have seen multiple makers integrating this new sensor into their devices. This year players like iBerry and Spice Mobiles also jumped into this competition, but here a student of 17 year old challenges the idea of use of fingerprint sensor in a gun.

Inspired by the tragic shooting at the Aurora, Colorado movie theater in July 2012, just about an hour’s drive from his home, the 17-year-old Kai Kloepfer is a student participatin in the SmartTech Challenges Foundation . Kai is busy developing “a firearm that knows who’s firing it.” This does sound interesting, as the gun requires authorization via a fingerprint sensor.

“A functioning biometric-access firearm would prevent firearm discharge by unauthorized users, such as children, people attempting to commit suicide, and people untrained to use the weapon,” says SmartTech foundation.

The biometric sensor can be programmed to authorize up to 999 users and boasts a 99.99% success rate – even with partial prints.

The technology Kai is working on has placed him in a group of the top 34 out of 7 million high school students around the globe in the 2013 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair.