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The Almighty Buck Government The Courts News

Make Money Fast 482

Posted by michael from the cashing-out dept.
rrwood writes "This is an intriguing insight into the activities of a master Canadian counterfeiter. The subject of the article, Wesley Weber, is/was a distinguished hacker and cracker who used a combination of technological skills and social engineering to produce what is probably the highest-quality counterfeit currency ever detected in Canada. Even more interesting to note is the widescale effect this one guy had, since he and his confederates single-handedly managed to force businesses to stop accepting $100CDN bills, thus affecting literally millions of people. The story is a fascinating look at his brief career, and the dumb, shortsighted mistakes ultimately responsible for his downfall."
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  • Yeah, but... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:35PM (#10155205)
    It's Canadian money. That doesn't count.

    (It's a joke! Posting anon since I'll be modded down to hell.)
    • But luckily it will be worth something in a few hundred years if it keeps going the way it is!

      (I'm Canadian -- I can say that.)

    • Re:Yeah, but... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by willy134 ( 682318 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:47PM (#10155277)
      highest-quality counterfeit currency ever detected

      Yeah those who do better are never detected. He is still not good enough obviously.

      • If it is done on sufficient scale (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Sycraft-fu ( 314770 ) on Saturday September 04, 2004 @01:22AM (#10156069)
        It's ALWAYS detected. The thing is money has serial numbers and those are tracked. So, even if you print counterfit bills that are 100% identicle to real ones (nearly impossible) you'll either being coliding with existing serial numbers, or using ones that aren't valid. This'll get notied if you do it in any sort of reasonable scale.

        It's the same thing as why there are no usable keygens for MMORPGs. It's not that the crackers can't reverse the algoithm for the keys, that's trivial. Problem is any key you generate will either be one that hasn't yet been issued, and therefore is invalid on the servers (most likely), or one that has been issued, and thus can't be used again.

    • So make C$500s, eh? (Score:3, Informative)

      by billstewart ( 78916 )
      The US no longer uses bills over $100 in general circulation, mainly because the Feds want to harass anybody engaged in cash businesses, like drug dealing and tax evasion, and force them into electronic banking systems where they're easier to detect. So a Canadian $500 bill is worth quite a bit more than a US $100 bill.

  • Obligatory USian Viewpoint (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:37PM (#10155212)
    "All that Canadian money looks phony to me!"

  • Knight Blinder. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:37PM (#10155215)
    "Even more interesting to note is the widescale effect this one guy had, since he and his confederates single-handedly managed to force businesses to stop accepting $100CDN bills, thus affecting literally millions of people."

    One man can make a difference.

  • $100 CN (Score:2, Funny)

    by HMA2000 ( 728266 )
    What is that like 84 cents US?

    • Re:$100 CN (Score:3, Informative)

      by g-to-the-o-to-the-g ( 705721 )
      For all the "har har i'm so funny lets bash canadians" comments out there, it should be noted that recently the Canadian dollar has actually been going up, rather then doing poorly like a certain someone's currency [ottawabusi...ournal.com].

      • Re:$100 CN (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Curtman ( 556920 )
        Unfortunately though, since the U.S. is our largest trading partner, a low USD means bad news for the CAD. We really need to do more to diversify in the world markets. People screamed bloody murder about how much Cretien's trade missions cost, but with China talking about building so many reactors now is the time we should be pushing Candu [candu.org]. The Americans are going to keep doing things to protect their markets as their dollar slides. That's how they operate. We need to look elsewhere when this happens.
        • Perhaps we should hedge our bets and join the EU. We don't have to use the currency. Then we'd be part of a bloc that is strong enough to stand up to the US and would be able to do something about the tens of thousands of jobs lost in the lumber industry. Heh: some countries like France might find Canada more acceptable in the EU than Turkey! ;)

          • Re:$100 CN (Score:5, Interesting)

            by Veridium ( 752431 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @11:07PM (#10155642) Homepage
            Nice try... Face the facts, you guys are stuck with us. The second you try to buddy up with the Europeans, GW will proclaim you a rogue state, that you are harboring terrorists, and that you are stockpiling WMD. Within a few months, we will bomb you, occupy you, and proclaim you liberated.

            On a serious note(yes, I was joking), you don't realize this yet, but it's the Euro that gives the EU the strength to stand up to us(speaking US centric here). Alot of people don't seem aware of this, but Iraq was a proxy war against the Euro. Saddam began selling oil in Euros back in '99 and because of the strength of the Euro, this proved lucrative for Iraq. Other Oil producing nations were talking about doing it as a result. That would have threatened the dollars standing as the world reserve currency, and thus, Americas ability to live the good life on credit. As long as oil is priced in dollars, everyone needs our dollars and they need our dollars to be valuable, so they work towards making them valuable.

            I know this whole thread is somewhat offtopic, but it really sucks that so few people seem to grasp the signifigance of all this. If you wanted to stand up to the US for real, you would need to embrace the EUs currency. The power of the US is rooted in the power of the dollar. Thems the facts. If the world rejected the US dollar as its reserve currency, and oil was suddenly priced in non-dollars, our ability to make war would be cut out from underneath us and our economy would collapse.

            Research fiat banking and the history of it and you'll begin to understand why this is.

            • Re:$100 CN (Score:3, Interesting)

              by ostiguy ( 63618 )
              Do you really believe this crazy talk? At peak, Iraq exported 3.7 million barrels per day, or 1.35 billion barrels. 1.35BB * US$40 a barrel = 54billion dollars for a year. Within the last year, the Japanese were spending as much as 40 billion a MONTH to sell yen and buy US dollars to keep their goods cheaper for US consumers. Asia's foreign exchange reserves totally swamp any one oil producing country's oil revenues.

              Furthermore, oil is traded on markets. Getting a commodity to be traded consistently again

              • Re:$100 CN (Score:5, Interesting)

                by Veridium ( 752431 ) on Saturday September 04, 2004 @12:57PM (#10158187) Homepage
                Do you really believe this crazy talk?

                What exactly is crazy about it? It's not like I'm saying that a secret world government is working with aliens...

                Asia's foreign exchange reserves totally swamp any one oil producing country's oil revenues.

                How does this contradict anything I said? Think about this... Why does Asia hold dollars and not Euro's? Why does any industrialized nation choose to hold dollars, despite our debt, despite our deficits, despite the worldwide illwill towards America? Answer: They need oil and oil is priced only in dollars. This is a simple answer, there are other complexities involved with certain trading partners, but by and large, this is the answer.

                Furthermore, oil is traded on markets.

                Yes, in dollars. Versus other commodities that are traded in a variety of currencies. No dollar, no oil.

                Saddam era Iraq would have needed a handful of other countrys togo along with him in a game of brinksmanship to try to tweak the oil market enough to change its ways.

                Yes, I never at any point claimed Iraq could do much on its own. What we feared, what we always fear, was the "domino effect". Iran and Venezuela were both toying with the idea of pricing their oil in something other than dollars. While you can no doubt conjure up enough islamo fascist demons to demonstrate why we would target Iran, why did we suddenly villainize Venezuela? You'll see as we go forward, any oil producing country that talks about selling oil in anything but dollars will be quickly villainized. We can't allow it if US hegemony is to continue. Pricing oil in Euros was a political tactic, but not one that would ever succeed

                Definetly not with one country doing it, but if a substantial number of oil producing countries were to do it, it would succeed. There is nothing crazy in what I'm saying at all. I think you're thinking I'm saying that if Iraq continued to do that by itself it would have toppled us. I wasn't saying that. If a substantial number of oil producing countries began pricing their oil in Euro's, there would be a large number of countries who would reduce their dollar reserves and increase their Euro reserves. This would greatly impact the value of the dollar and would substantially reduce our ability to sway other nations.

  • Mum always said... (Score:5, Funny)

    by ebsf1 ( 689864 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:38PM (#10155226)
    Work hard and you can 'make' lots of money.

  • YRO? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by athakur999 ( 44340 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:39PM (#10155231) Journal
    So this is filed under the YRO category because....?

    Or is counterfeiting another one of those things t3h 3v1l g0v3rnm3n7 is trying to take away?

    • Well you know, since you can't use Photoshop to help you counterfeit without patching it to ignore banknote signatures...
    • So this is filed under the YRO category because....?

      because everybody should have the right to print money on their inkjet.

      oh, wait..

    • Re:YRO? (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Because people other than the government can take away your rights. If you were Canadian this guy would be making your dollar worth less, making you unable to spend your $100 bills, and making it more likely that you've been paid with phoney baloney.

      I don't dare call it "stealing" because the "copyright violation is not theft" crowd will probably jump all over me. But whatever you want to call it, it's just as bad and it is a violation of your rights.

    • Re:YRO? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Sheepdot ( 211478 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:05PM (#10155372) Journal
      I once had the idea of making counterfeit US money for tourists travelling to other countries. The idea was that when you ran into someone who mugged you, instead of giving them your wallet you'd just pull out your money clip of fake US twenties, tens, and fives and give it to them.

      The sheer joy at landing such a great deal of cash will dissuade them from stealing actual valuables like cameras, credit cards, and checks. After all, when you've just been handed say, $400 in cash, why bother trying to hide the other stuff you just stole?

      Besides, those new bills look so fake, they are extremely easy to duplicate by appearance anyway. And a look of grief over losing it is so easy to fake. So that is a legitimate form of counterfeiting, but yet is illegal to do.

      • Re:YRO? (Score:3, Informative)

        by tylernt ( 581794 )
        Cool idea. One might combine it with Massad Ayoob's [starbulletin.com] technique. "...he always carries a $10 bill wrapped around a matchbook, and tosses that to the mugger first."

        ...oh, and sorry if the above link offends anyone. It was the only reference to Ayoob and his matchbook that I could find online.

      • Re:YRO? (Score:3, Insightful)

        by graveyhead ( 210996 )
        instead of giving them your wallet you'd just pull out your money clip of fake US twenties
        OK, so instead of stealing from you, the mugger ends up stealing from someone else when he spends your fake cash. In the end, someone ends up holding the bag and losing out.

        If there is any karma in this world, you'll get it as change from that half-calf latte, you insensitive clod!

      • Re:YRO? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by jamesh ( 87723 ) on Saturday September 04, 2004 @05:56AM (#10156647)
        your cries of 'but your honour, I only intended this fake cash to thwart muggers' will be laughed out of court.

        Monopoly money might do just as well though :)
    • They could just ban everyone from the server that had the fake money, whether they were the dupers or not. I think just not taking fake money is the good solution here.

      http://penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2004-08-2 5& res=l

  • Best looking *caught* so far (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Of course crimes of this nature are usually closely followed by greed but imagine the possibility of someone only making enough to stay well under the radar. Of course that could be happening right now ;)

  • The advertisements (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Man of E ( 531031 ) <i.have@no.email.com> on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:42PM (#10155245)
    Isn't it great how there are advertisements for inkjet printers on the second, third, fourth pages of the article? Now you know, those things just pay for themselves if you use them right :-)

  • Summary of article... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by cjustus ( 601772 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:43PM (#10155257) Homepage
    Just finished reading this in the magazine minutes ago... 20 something small time guy begins creating relatively good counterfeit $100 notes... Produces between 6 and 16 million dollars worth... All while on probation... One interesting idea is that he doesn't pass the money himself, but rather sells it for 20% of it's value to others... The counterfeit money has a street price of around 70% of the face value... Interesting that there is a relatively clear distribution system and market pricing at various levels...

    Pretty hard to find stores that take $100 bills these days around here, but the article notes that acceptance is improving, that counterfeit money is quite rare (1 bill per 290 people) ... and that new bill technology is making it harder and harder...

    Also points out that the vast majority of people are lazy, don't look at the bills, and that frequently even really bad copies will be accepted from time to time...

    • Re:Summary of article... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by dsanfte ( 443781 ) * on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:09PM (#10155389) Journal
      One bill per 290 people isn't rare. It's commonplace. Every store here has a UV currency checker. McDonalds employees are getting a crash course in currency examination. At one store where they'd gotten two counterfeit 50s in a single day, they not only stopped taking 100s and 50s, they refused to take the "old" 5s 10s and 20s, and even held the new ones up to the light. We had to wait in line while they did this for every single customer.

      Please tell me it's like this in the states, and tell me again how 1 in 290 is rare.

      • "...they not only stopped taking 100s and 50s, they refused to take the "old" 5s 10s and 20s, and even held the new ones up to the light. We had to wait in line while they did this for every single customer."

        And you continued to patronize this establishment why?

      • It is definitely not like this whre I live in the states.

      • Re:Summary of article... (Score:4, Informative)

        by orenmnero ( 554064 ) on Saturday September 04, 2004 @12:18AM (#10155897) Homepage
        Well, according to the Bank of Canada, 36 billion was in circulation in 2001, and 19 cents per person in circulation was counterfeit. Canada has a population of about 32,000,000, so 32,000,000 * 0.19 =~ 6,000,000. 6,000,000 / 36,000,000,000 = 1.67e-4. 40% of this value was accounted for by $100 counterfeits.

        Now, the bank says there are about 1.1 billion notes in circulation, or 35 per person. If there is one counterfiet bill per 290 people, that comes to 32,000,000 / 290 = 110,000 counterfiet bills in circulation. So again 110,000 / 1,100,000,000 = 0.0001, or 1 bill per 10,000.

        Obviously these places run around distribution rings and some places will see a much higher frequency than others. And one currency, the $20, accounts for 50% of counterfeits. So in comparison, those will be relatively frequent, while the others will be much less so.

        http://www.bankofcanada.ca/en/review/summer04/ch an t.htm

  • New bills (Score:5, Informative)

    by g-to-the-o-to-the-g ( 705721 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:44PM (#10155259) Homepage Journal
    This is sorta irrelavent now, because recently the Canadian mint has come out with several new bills [www.cbc.ca] which are extremely difficult to counterfeit. THe new $20 bill came out last week I believe, and we've had new $100, $10 and $5 bills for ages now.

    • Re:New bills (Score:4, Insightful)

      by stubear ( 130454 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:09PM (#10155386)
      "This is sorta irrelavent now, because recently the Canadian mint has come out with several new bills [www.cbc.ca] which are extremely difficult to counterfeit."
      That's all fine and well but have they pulled all the old currency out of circulation and if not are they planning on pulling it anytime soon?

      Two problems plague countries that face high rates of counterfeit currency. First, the expense of putting new currency into the publics hands is large enough without having to worry about pulling old currency. As long as older bills are around, people can counterfeit them and expect places to accept them should they slip past the meager, if any at all, counterfeit detection most stores employ. Iraq recently went through a currency exchange program and it was utter chaos. The Apocalypse would be far more orderly if they tried something like that in the US.

      The second problem is where currency is counterfeited. The US's biggest problem with counterfeit currency isn't in the states, it's overseas and in some countries in South and Central America. Many drug cartels in Columbia have been caught counterfeiting US currency as well. These countries lack the knowledge and/or ability to properly detect counterfeit US currency and it's not until the money is eventually transferred to US banks that it's caught.

      • Re:New bills (Score:2, Informative)

        by chewy_2000 ( 618148 )
        We changed our notes about a decade ago here in Australia, and as far as I know they are effectively impossible to counterfeit properly. Obviously a smaller economy/population that the US, but I don't recall any significant problem with the changeover. The new notes were introduced gradually, starting from the $5 up.
        More details on the security features:
        Here. [rba.gov.au]

      • Re:New bills (Score:4, Informative)

        by mindstrm ( 20013 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:51PM (#10155572)
        Yes - they are pulling the old bills out of circulation.

        Notice the MAIN problem with counterfitting in Canada, and it was mentioned repeatedly in the article, is that people simply did not usually check.. because we didn't have a real big problem with fake bills previously.

        Second.. US currency, outside the US.
        As someone who spends US currency and lives in central america.. you are correct, but for the wrong reasons.

        People here do indeed know how to detect fake US currency; in fact, they are probably MORE aware of it than most people in the US. US bills are very closely examined here by everyone, and there are TONS of fakes out there. Every bar I know has sample fakes they've caught people with.

        Further to that.. if you are passing a fake here, the cops won't be called unless you are literally trying to buy something big with entirely fake money. A merchant finding a note to be fake will say "This is fake" and probably give it back to you, if he feels in the mood. Even the banks; on depositing money into a bank, if they find one US bill to be fake, they'll tell you so, punch a hole in it, and let you keep it. They would actually have to suspect you of trying to scam them before they'll get the authorities involved.

        The reason counterfeitting is a much bigger deal in latin america is because, to put it plainly, it's a lot easier to get away with.

        Counterfeitting something that is not legal tender isn't all that big a deal.. you won't go to the federal pen unless you counterfeit the local currency.

        Drug cartels counterfeit because the distribution methods needed to profit from it are identical to those used for drugs.. they are already in a position to move the stuff without any additional effort or risk.

  • Crap... (Score:2, Funny)

    by wazerface ( 752726 )
    And now how in the world do we buy anything in Canada without $100 dollar bills?

    • Re:Crap... (Score:3, Funny)

      by Justin205 ( 662116 )
      We go off and shoot a beaver or two (or moose, if that's more your thing) and then trade them...

      "I'll give you two beaver pelts for the 512 MB of RAM."

      (I'm a Canadian -- So I can make fun of Canada. :P)
    • And now how in the world do we buy anything in Canada without $100 dollar bills?

      I guess everybody will have to start using hens and basktets of apples again.

      So when people are talking about fiat money, they are actually talking about that old car out back.

      Can't be half bad.

  • US currency Legal Tender (Score:5, Informative)

    by SuperBanana ( 662181 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:45PM (#10155265)
    businesses to stop accepting $100CDN bills, thus affecting literally millions of people

    I was under the impression that doing so at least in the US was illegal, until I actually (gasp!) googled it to make sure I was.

    First link was to the US Treasury Department's FAQ on just that subject: Legal Tender Status [ustreas.gov].

    I always thought it was illegal to refuse currency, but that nobody enforced it. Learn something every day. Honestly- it should be illegal for businesses to refuse currency; I don't care about the inconvenience of them having to change a $50 or $100 bill; if it's all I've got and I need gas, food, or lodging, well, they should have to accept it. It's very easy for it to be an issue of safety, and absurd to have money in your pocket in the industrialized world and not be able to use it. Nevermind that it should not be compulsory to use plastic.

    • What if they don't trust that the money has any value?
    • Why should it be illegal? I don't agree with any law that says that I must be forced to sell to you (which is essentially what you are saying). It is my business and my choice whether I let you pay for a $2 candy bar with a $100 bill. Now if I chose to not sell to you because of race, color or creed then you might have a case.

    • Re:US currency Legal Tender (Score:5, Insightful)

      by InfiniteWisdom ( 530090 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:15PM (#10155417) Homepage
      If $50 or $100 is all you've got then you head over to an ATM and get some twenties. You can find those easily in the industralized world, right? No reason for the guy behind the register in the convenience store to have to assume the added risk of having hundreds of dollars in the till. You're not the only one for which it can be an issue of safety, you know?

      • There's a problem with that too. Some bank machines give $50 bills when you widthdraw in $100 denominations.

        The other day, for instance, I widthdrew $100. I needed to buy some clothes and food. The bank machine gave me two $50. All the banks were closed so I couldn't exhange for smaller currency then.

        Plus, it was the last of my money until payday. I was lucky to find a retailer to accept them. I might have been screwed had they been fake. I know that possessing a fake is a criminal act, but had I had a "r
        • You do have a point there.

          In India (where I grew up) a 100 rupee note is equivalent to a $20 bill here, in terms of the frequency of use not exchange value. i.e. you could expect to hand over a Rs.100 note and get change back from a bagful of groceries the way you would with a $20 here.

          So most ATMs I saw would return at least Rs. 500 in 100s and the rest in 500s. Pretty smart and convenent. I don't know if any of the ATMs here do that because I rarely withdraw more than $40 or $60 :)
        • Next time, withdraw $80 or $120. Problem solved.

    • Re:US currency Legal Tender (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Malc ( 1751 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:17PM (#10155427)
      As a business man, why should I do business with you if I don't want to? Maybe I'm not so desparate or greedy that I need your money. Don't be so self-centred!

    • It could be worse, people here take $200 bills (Score:4, Funny)

      by stretch0611 ( 603238 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:19PM (#10155439) Journal
      Some idiot actually accepted a $200 bill with GW Bush on the front. Its hard to beat that. Here is the link to that article. [sungazette.com]
    • Honestly- it should be illegal for businesses to refuse currency; I don't care about the inconvenience of them having to change a $50 or $100 bill; if it's all I've got and I need gas, food, or lodging, well, they should have to accept it

      Nonsense. If you come up to me in the street and wave money in my face, I don't have to take it. Same goes for the guy working behind the counter in the average store. Most people are willing to change them up anyway, but the few that don't are perfectly within their rig
    • Legal tender only applies to debts. I don't have to agree to sell you anything in the first place if all you have to offer me is, say, a $100.
      • Legal tender only applies to debts. I don't have to agree to sell you anything in the first place if all you have to offer me is, say, a $100.

        That raises an interesting question then. I walk into your store, pull a can of Coke off the shelf, and drink it. I'm now indebted to you for $1 or whatever. Can you still refuse my $100 given that I've just incurred this debt?
    • It shoudln't be.. a business should be free to accept or refuse whatever terms of barter they like.

      Why should any merchant have to accept anything? You have no contract with them; you are free to take your business elsewhere. They don't OWE you anything... that's the whole point. If the terms of the deal aren't favorable.. either party can refuse. If you don't like it, you can take your business to someone else who has more favorable ways of doing business. If your opinion is shared by many, then the merc
    • To deny you service. Bussinesses have a right to deny anyone service. The only time it can really get them in trouble is if they are categorically and automatically refusing service (like refusing to serve any blacks). However they can toss you from the store if they don't like you.

      Well, cash is just an extension of that, they have a right to refuse to take your money and do bussiness with you.
  • This is interesting; I wonder (purely out of curiosity I assure you) which nation's currency is the easiest to counterfeit (that is, requires the least effort). If one could make a list of the easiest currencies to forge and then print billions of those monies well, regardless of the exchange rates, that must be worth some american dollars. Make sure that the american dollars you get back are more than what you put into the counterfeiting machinery and materials in the first place and you've got a bone fide

  • Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by sirReal.83. ( 671912 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:48PM (#10155282) Homepage

    "Highest-quality counterfeit currency ever detected"

    Is that anything like "America's greatest solved mysteries" ?

  • The technology in a Canadian banknote rivals that (Score:5, Funny)

    by t0qer ( 230538 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:50PM (#10155292) Homepage Journal
    The technology in a Canadian banknote rivals that of cellphones and other gadgets it shares pockets and purses with, putting the machinery and technical skill needed to exactly reproduce anti-counterfeit features beyond the reach of those who would thwart them.


    So how long before we see Canadian dollars running BSD? Will a beowulf cluster make my money work for me?

  • obligatory canada currency joke (Score:5, Funny)

    by Guano_Jim ( 157555 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @09:57PM (#10155328)
    This guy is clearly a loonie.

  • "affecting literally millions of people." (Score:3, Informative)

    by Malc ( 1751 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:08PM (#10155385)
    ... seems like a bit of a sensational exageration. The $100 is hardly missed. I've only had a small handful over the years. Even $50s aren't that widespread. I see those a few times a month when I get larger quantities from the bank, but $20s are still the most common for even withdrawals of several hundred dollars. Maybe I bank in the wrong place.
    • Or maybe you're not spending enough? :-)

      The other day I paid for my insurance with a 1.000 dollar bill - yes, one thousand Canadian dollars bill.

      You should have seen the lady's face. Very funny, actually, as she had seen me put one bill on the counter while she was still filling in some stuff. The insurance came to just under 1000, so she was sitting there talking to my father and waiting for me to put more bills on the counter. First time for her, or anyone in that office, to see 1.000 bills.
      • Funny story that.

        Seriously, though.. how many $1000 bills have you seen?

        How many $100 or even $50 bills do you see on a daily basis coming out of people's wallets? (or even flashed from within one?)

        Canada has become so hooked on Interac that cash is almost a nono.. I was back home (B.C.) on Vacation... and had probably $300 in my wallet.. and most people were like "Wow you carry too much money"... $300, and I'm an anomaly.
        Typically, I have double that in my pocket.

        I have never actually seen a real life

  • Looooong article, but worth the read (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MoralHazard ( 447833 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:10PM (#10155394)
    I highly recommend RTFAing. It's a good story, and lots of juicy techy details.

    The biggest problem, it seems to me, is that whatever technical features they introduce to protect banknotes, it doesn't do a damn bit of good unless every high-school dropout grocery clerk can use those features effectively to identify bad notes. You could have forty kinds of anti-counterfeiting devices on a note, but unless the public can easily and quickly use those features, they aren't going to help.

    This got me started thinking on using crypto to protect banknotes--try embedding an RFID-type device into every banknote, with a simple chip that can perform a SHA-1 signing back-ending the RFID mechanism. An RF device sends a random number to the bill, which receives that number and SHA-1 signs it, and returns the signature. If you put the same private key into all of the bills, you could build relatively simple, hand-held currency scanners that all have the public key and can verify that the bill is real.

    This has its problems:
    1) Can we actually build a chip/RF mechanism small enough and robust enough to be used in paper currency?
    2) I can imagine this kind of mechanism adding a lot of expense to the note manufacturing process.
    3) In order to use this, you'd have to distribute gazillions of RF scanners to the point-of-sale. Expensive, and not fast to get that kind of gadget penetration.
    4) Tamper-resistence: you have to build the SHA-1 chips so that they can't be broken open. This is similar to the MS Trusted Computing issue--is it possible to store a key in a physical device such that the key cannot be extracted physically?

    That last problem is the worst--it's a lot like the DVD CSS encryption scheme problem. It works find until ONE INSTANCE of the private key gets broken, and then everybody has the key to every single banknote in circulation. And then the whole thing is kaput, money down the drain (literally). So it would be awfully important to solve the tamper-proofing issue, before you went ahead with this idea.

    Shit, I gotta get a girlfriend--posting coherent ideas to Slashdot at 11 on a Friday night is pretty busted.

    • Re:Looooong article, but worth the read (Score:4, Interesting)

      by chris_sawtell ( 10326 ) on Saturday September 04, 2004 @03:01AM (#10156316) Journal
      Yup, the story _is_ gripping, but at the same time both the parent posting and the story show how current thinking about paper money is fatally flawed.

      The fix is to have EFT-POS used widely, and to have a much less counterfeitable currency for the odd transaction which still needs it. Here in little old NZ almost every business doing legitimate cash sales has a terminal. The 'paper' money is printed on a clear plastic film, with the registration of the printing on the two sides of the plastic being perfect. There are two 'holes' in the printing where you can check it. Certainly it's quite impossible to replicate it using a computer and an ink-jet printer. For a central bank to design a currency so that a kid with a printer worth a few hundred bucks can replicate it so simply is just plain lunacy on the part of the central bank. Leaves the country open to economic sabotage by any bunch of wealthy neredowells. Think of the social chaos if Al-Qaeda dropped a few tons of forged banknotes on any Western city. The cash economy would grind to a halt in a day or two.

  • JSG Boggs (Score:5, Interesting)

    by vena ( 318873 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:17PM (#10155425)
    if you want to talk about art, let's talk about JSG Boggs [jsgboggs.com]. this man DRAWS the notes BY HAND, and has been doing it since 1984. his art is not only his physical artistic ability in recreating the bills in great detail (with his little added puns), but in creating social networks around the passing of his bills. he tells people they're not real bills and gives them the choice of accepting his art in return for goods and services, or to accept real money.

  • er... filed under "Your Rights Online" ? (Score:5, Funny)

    by bani ( 467531 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:18PM (#10155437)
    what, /. editors believe counterfeiting is a constitutional right or something?

  • Why 100CDN denominations? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by rampant mac ( 561036 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:26PM (#10155467)
    I've been talking about this with my coworkers over the last couple of days... Why do counterfeiters ALWAYS pick huge denominations? I understand there is a "cost" involved when producing fake money; I understand they all want to get rich quick. What if a counterfeiter stuck with small denominations? Who here (referencing anyone who handles money on a regular basis) gives $1s, $5s, or $10s a second glance? Usually cashiers will shove those bills into the drawer without thinking twice.

    Any thoughts?

    • Risk vs. reward:

      It's just as illegal to pass a phony $5 as it is to pass a phony $100. You have to pass twenty $5 bills, which you could do in a single transaction or in twenty separate transactions. Either way, you dramatically increase the odds of getting caught. If you're going to take the risk, go all the way.

      ROI:

      Like you said, it costs real money to produce quality fake money. If it costs just as much to produce a phony $5 as a phony $100, but the return is significantly less, common sense and econo

    • Simple, time spend spending them (Score:5, Informative)

      by SmallFurryCreature ( 593017 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @11:03PM (#10155623) Journal
      Say you got a big stack of 10.000 notes. Now you want to convert them to real money. There are a numbed of ways to do it but the simplest is either selling the stack to someone else for real money who will then spend the fake or spend the fakes yourselve.

      The way to do it is to buy goods with fake money and get real goods and real change. You can then return or resale the goods for more real money.

      So why not $1 dollar bills? What exactly would that buy you? 1 Mars bar? That would only work if you had a very low initial investment to counterfeit and were just using it to take care of living expenses. Just the small problem then that there would be a steady stream of counterfits near your house with your finger prints on it.

      You can buy more expensive goods with $1 dollar bills but people get suspiscious when you pay for a new car with a pallet of cash.

      Counterfit money is the balance between being low enough in value to be easily accepted and high enough in value to be worthwhile spending.

  • This guy is my cousin! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by B5_geek ( 638928 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @10:42PM (#10155536)
    Wes has never been after more then a get-rich-quick kind of guy. Every type of scam/pyramid scheme out there he has tried at least once.

    He has always worked very hard at not working. Anything to make an easy buck.

    He has also been arrested for growing pot, (several million dollars worth IIRC).

    This guy is not worthy of any praise or adoration. We (the family) strongly suspect that he was a scape goat for organized crime in Toronto. He is NOT the evil mastermind that the media is making him out to be.

    I know his MO. He will be back in jail again.
  • "It would be very difficult to produce notes that nobody could detect," says Ray Haywood, a former RCMP anti-counterfeit officer who is now with the investigations and forensic services arm of PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. "If the bad guys ever found out how to do that, they'd get quite busy."

    thank you, mr. obvious

  • US $100 bills aren't that hard to counterfeit. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by multiplexo ( 27356 ) * on Friday September 03, 2004 @11:09PM (#10155650) Journal
    When I lived in Germany in 1998-99 the only place you could exchange $100 bills was a bank or currency exchange, and they required that you produce positive ID in the form of a passport or German ID card before they would accept the bill. This was because the US bills were easily counterfeited and apparently several hundred million dollars worth of them had been run off by Iran and North Korea.

    I wonder how hard it would be to just use OCR to track money these days. You could put scanners into each ATM that would scan bills as they were dispensed and store the serial numbers, a trivial bit of OCR. You could also have banks install scanners at each teller's station when they dispense the cash (many of Washington Mutual's new branches have teller stations that are like ATMs, you make your withdrawal and the teller never handles the cash, it is dispensed from a slot. By tracking serial numbers you could see how your currency is flowing. Additionally you could spot counterfeiting, if bill serial number 1234567890 is simultaneously used in several locations and scanned you could assume that it was counterfeited. No fancy RFID's required, just modifications to bill dispensing machines in banks and other financial institutions which could easily and quietly be mandated by the Department of the Treasury.

  • Has anyone noticed? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by BCW2 ( 168187 ) on Friday September 03, 2004 @11:52PM (#10155824) Journal
    All the criminals you hear about are dumb? They all do something stupid to get caught. The smart ones are the ones you'll never hear about. Maybe their crime will get coverage but you'll never hear the name.

    I'm sure there are some smart one out there, but I've never heard of them.
    • That even really smart people make mistakes. You miscalculate or slip up. When you are doing that in a criminal activity, usually one is all it takes. I mean what may seem dumb and obvious to you is not that way to another.

      As a somewhat related example I wrote a program that worked almost, but not completely, right for a CS assignment. It frustrated me to hell and I kept adding more and more debug code, all of it reading that the program was working fine. I got fed up and called a friend and he came over t

  • Plastic notes (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dcam ( 615646 ) <david@nosPAm.uberconcept.com> on Saturday September 04, 2004 @08:00AM (#10156906) Homepage
    In Australia the notes are plastic. You can't just print something off an inkjet.

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