important for us to have accountability of firearms, to know where the firms are. reporter: but the atf numbers, as large as they are, don t reflect the full extent of the problem because the agency only has enough staff and resources to inspect about one in ten gun dealers each year. it does try to target known or d actors. 67 dealers had their licenses revoked last year for not reporting or misreporting firearms. but in many cases dealers tell authorities the guns were lost or stolen. the brady center to prevent gun violence maintains that some dealers are corrupt, selling guns under the table, off the books without background checks of the buyers. these are the guns that are prized by the gang bangers because they know it won t easily be traced back to them or where they got the gun. reporter: we were unable to reach a trade group representing gun sellers and the national rifle association said it had no comment because it isn t involved in gun sales. the atf says it would be
missing last year. more than 62,000 disappeared over the past three years. air lot more guns are missing than i think anyone would like to have. i believe that it s very important for us to have accountability of firearms, to know where the firearms are. reporter: but the atf numbers, as large as they are, don t reflect the full extent of the problem because the agency only has enough staff and resources inspect about one in ten gun dealers each year that does try to target known or suspected bad actors. 67 dealers had their licenses revoked last year for not reporting or misreporting missing firearms, but in many cases dealers tell authorities the guns were lost or stollen. the brady center to prevent gun violence maintains that some dealers are corrupt, selling guns under the table, off the books, without background checks of the buyers.