Reply #9: This has been going on for over a decade, especially with copiers

[MadHound]

I used to be in the printing biz, and this tactic started in the late eighties when color copiers started being able to crank out some pretty good copies of cash. Initially Xerox was the first to instigate this practice, but it has now spread to all copier companies and models.

And now that printers are reaching to the heights of reality in the dupllicating arena, the printer companies are have jumped on board the yellow dot bandwagon, and now virtually every single color printer does print these traceable codes. And while this code is only supposed to be used as a tool to fight crime, it can be put to other more sinister uses.

But there are a couple of steps you can take if you are seriously paranoid. The first is to buy your color printer used, from an anonymous source where you pay cash, such as a flea market, pawn shop, etc. The other solution is only for those who are technically savvy, and that is to reprogram your printer so that it doesn't print the code. I have no idea how this is done, but I know that it can be done. A couple of different copier techs have stated this to me, and these guys know their stuff.

While I agree that we need to fight counterfeiting, I'm not sure that this is the right method. The incredible realism that modern color copiers can produce will take your breath away. But there are other less intrusive methods of preventing copier forgery being used, and I would rather go with one of these. My favorite is that if you slap a dollar bill down on the glass, the copier will recognize it for what it is, and simply print out black sheets. I think that if they can do this in copiers, then they should be able to do this in printers, and thus take away those nasty embedded yellow dots.

But until then one should figure that anything that you copy or print is traceable, and act accordingly.