"6500 hits a day" - An Urban Legend

The media and the anti-gun lobby can't seem to let this one go. Recent articles continue to perpetuate this performance fallacy. Some writers are still using the old "5000 hits" from the Coalition for Gun Control (which originally was "2000 hits"). "6500 hits" and the Canadian Firearms Centre can't demonstrate that even one life has been saved by the use of the registry (remember, "public safety" was the rationale for the registry, not administrative regulation of firearms). The hits are not necessarily (and probably mostly not) related to public safety enquiries. Here's what the department responsible for the Canadian Firearms Centre, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Canada* say about the "6500 hits":

Q18. How can you say that the gun registry is a useless criminal justice tool when the police use it 6,500 times per day?

A18. The “6,500 hits” figure for the Canadian Firearms Registry On-Line (CFRO) is misleading. Whenever police officers access the Canadian Police Information Centre (CPIC) for any reason, such as for a simple address check, an automatic hit is generated with CFRO whether the information is desired or not. This is the case, for example, with the Toronto Police Service (5,000 officers), the Vancouver Police (1,400 officers), and the BC RCMP (5,000 officers).

To provide a parallel example for ordinary folk surfing the web, every time you access a modern website (including this one) you generate a "hit", and also when you visit specific areas within the site, especially advertizers. Most times, you didn't even know you did. The "hit counters" are what advertizers use to calculate fees and revenues from the web traffic.

(* The Canadian Firearms Centre was recently transferred back to the RCMP after a undistinguished stint as its own department)

Update:

From:

Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security
EVIDENCE number 07, UNEDITED COPY - COPIE NON ÉDITÉE
Wednesday, June 7, 2006:

* * *

MP Dave MacKenzie: All I'm trying to indicate to Canadians, though, is that there are not 5,000 checks a day just for firearms registry. Those are automatic checks done by police officers on the street for names and for a variety of things.

RCMP Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli: They're automatic CPIC checks that they automatically go over. I don't have the number of how many are direct checks.