By Romie A. Evangelista

The Interior Department and the National Police plan to conduct another round of ballistic tests on all the 1.2 million firearms that are registered with the Firearms and Explosives Division of Camp Crame.

The tests will help upgrade the police record system and build a computerized database a la CSI, a source said referring to the American TV series on scene of the crime investigation.

Two senior officers who declined to be named told the Standard Today in separate interviews that the proposed test will cover individual and group/corporate gun owners like security agencies.

Each ballistic test will cost a gun holder P1,000.

Through the ?re-ballistics,? police can set up a permanent record of the shells and slugs of all registered firearms for easy reference, particularly when a gun is used in a crime, the sources said.

The plan entails the use of a machine called Integrated Ballistic Identification System, which is a product of Canada. It is similar to the technology used in the Automated Fingerprint Identification System.

The IBIS equipment will be housed in a new building to be constructed near the PNP Crime Lab office in Camp Crame, the sources said.

The proposed system can generate at least P1.3 billion in annual revenues for Interior Department and the police. ?If the whole thing becomes operational, the PNP will get a share of P200 million annually or 25 percent of all revenues from the re-ballistics of all the estimated 1.3 million registered firearms at the FED,? one of the sources said.

The other officer privy to the plan said many gun owners, including private security agencies, are expected to oppose the plan as this would entail huge expenses for them during the registration of their guns.

?For example, a security agency that has 200 registered firearms will have to shell out P200,000 annually for the re-ballistics alone,? the source said. Gun dealers and suppliers will also increase their markup to offset the additional cost they incur in having their guns re-tested, the source said.