GHOST Act Mandates Federal Tracking of Barrels, Slides, and Bolt Carriers Five Days Before Shipment

The Gun Hardware Oversight and Shipment Tracking Act of 2025, or the GHOST Act, is setting up a comprehensive federal system to monitor the sale and transport of specific firearm components. This isn’t about fully assembled firearms; it targets three key parts: the barrel, the slide, and the bolt carrier. If you’re a business shipping any of these across state lines or internationally, the Attorney General is creating a mandatory registration system you have to use.

The New Paperwork Trail: Registering Before You Ship

Under this bill (Sec. 2), if you’re shipping a covered component, you can’t just drop it in the mail. You must register the shipment with the Attorney General at least five business days before it leaves your facility. This registration requires extensive detail from both the sender and the recipient, including names, addresses, contact info, and a unique ID number—which could be the last four digits of your Social Security Number or IRS ID. Think of it as filing a detailed manifest for a single part, five days in advance, every single time.

Certified Mail or Bust: Shipping Gets Complicated

The GHOST Act doesn’t just track the parts; it dictates how you ship them. If you use the mail, it must be registered or certified, complete with a return receipt. If you use a private courier, the service must require a signature upon delivery. The goal is clear: zero anonymity and a verifiable paper trail for every component. And once it’s shipped, the process isn’t over. Within five business days of the initial registration, the shipper must send follow-up documentation to the Attorney General proving the part was actually delivered and signed for. If you can’t get that delivery confirmation, you have to keep sending updates every five business days until you can prove it arrived.

What Happens If You Miss the Deadline?

If a part is shipped without the required five-day advance notice, the bill includes a couple of administrative fixes, but they come with risk. You can file a registration retroactively up to five business days after delivery. The recipient can also file a “putative registration” if the shipper failed to do their part. However, the Attorney General has the power to cut off this retroactive option entirely if they decide a business is “routinely” skipping the initial requirement. For small businesses or individuals who might make an honest mistake, this discretionary power means the AG could potentially block the fix, leading to serious consequences.

The Database and the Seizure Risk

All this collected information—the names, addresses, and transaction details for every barrel, slide, and bolt carrier shipped—goes into a new federal database. The bill explicitly allows this database to be shared with Federal, State, local, Tribal, and even foreign law enforcement agencies and prosecutors. Critically, the bill states that this information is exempt from the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), meaning the public won’t have access to details about who is accessing this data or how it’s being used, raising significant transparency concerns. If a component is shipped without any of the required registrations, law enforcement can seize it, and the Attorney General can seek a court order to destroy the part.

The Real-World Cost of Non-Compliance

For regular folks or small businesses dealing in these components, the stakes are high. Knowingly shipping a covered component across state lines to avoid these rules carries penalties of fines or up to one year in prison. If you ship 50 or more components in a single incident, that penalty jumps to up to 10 years. This means administrative non-compliance—failing to register or use the right mail service—can land you in serious legal trouble. The bill creates a system where every transaction involving these three specific parts is logged, tracked, and accessible to a wide array of government agencies, placing a heavy burden of meticulous record-keeping and mandatory certified shipping costs on the seller.