A man from south China's Fujian Province was arrested on July 31 by police from Anshan Public Security Bureau in NE China's Liaoning Province for illegally trafficking firearms online. 

The seller was taken in by police for selling, not regular firearms, but for selling keychains that can be used as pocket pistols. The revolver-style pocket pistol keychain can be used as a non-military gun and has a shooting function according to an identification report by the appraisal center at National Police University of China. In this case, it is classified as a gun, police from Anshan Public Security Bureau announced on Tuesday night. 

We thought it was only a four-centimeter keychain but the police identified it as firearm, the man's wife, surnamed with Cheng, said to China National Video. 

He sold stimulated gun-shaped keychains only for collections or displays and never considered it would be related to firearms, according to Cheng.

"It was just a little keychain," Cheng said then, "Even though it could fire, we never produced or sold any gunpowder."

According to Cheng, after bringing back a small gun-shaped keychain pendent from abroad a few years ago, her husband decided to produce 4-centimeter keychains and sell them online.

"It is even less dangerous than a knife or a bow," she continued said," No injuries has ever been reported." 

The 4-centimeter keychain case has led to a dispute about firearm identification. 

According to a document about firearm identification issued by the Ministry of Public Security in 2010, guns that reach a muzzle velocity of 1.8 joules per square centimeters are identified as firearms in China.

However, the attorney for Cheng's family, Yang Weihua, said, in this case, even though the muzzle velocity reached the identification standard, the keychain, only 4 centimeters in diameter, is too small to be grasped by an adult's hand.

Qiao Feng, a lawyer having represented several cases related to firearms, considered that the key point in this case was to identify weather the keychain has the risk to cause death or injury.

The case has also stirred a heated discussion on social media in China.

In a video which has attracted over 10,000 comments and 50,000 likes on Weibo, the Twitter-like social media site in China, the mini-sized gun can even shoot through an iron barrel under certain conditions.

"I once saw a mini-size pistol, less than the size of a 1 yuan coin, in Beijing Police Museum," @Venk007 said under the video, "It is designed for spies".

"It is not a gun-shaped keychain," said @Yunhejun, "It is a keychain-shaped gun!"