The US market is flooded with fake dollars, thanks to the presence of high-tech counterfeiters, writes The Los Angeles Times. The paper writes that in response to this development, the US Federal Reserve has decided to introduce new currency notes of denominations of $5 and $10 to combat high-tech fakes. The Fed had put into circulation new bills of denominations of $100, $50 and $20 in 1996.Since then, the number of counterfeiters arrested annually has doubled to 3,466 last year. The new redesigned bills of the higher denominations carry huge portraits of former US presidents and a host of other special security features. The authorities admitted that technological advances had given the counterfeiters an edge and that the Fed was fighting an "almost unwinnable war".
A senior Secret Service agent, who is an expert in counterfeiting, Donald Ray, says, "It's a nightmare. In the past, there was only a handful of people with the specialised knowledge to do it (counterfeit notes)." He says, "Now, with the technology, high school kids or anybody can do it. It all boils down to whether they like to play with computers or not." Till a few years ago, counterfeiting was an elaborate, expensive and time-consuming process. In those days, one had to be a master printer, using offset typesetting, metal plates, ink and special paper to create fake notes. But now computers have made the job easy for anyone to get into the game.
Digital counterfeiters use computers to scan the images of the original notes and churn out fake currency on desktop printers. LA Times writes that some even download digitised images of fake notes circulating on the Internet to make "funny money". The notes may not look as original, but there are so many of them out there that the even Secret Service was overwhelmed.
Southern California is considered to be a hotbed of counterfeiting. An estimate shows that over $75,000 fake currencies come into circulation every week and the figure is expected to touch the $100,000 mark soon. According to the Secret Service, counterfeiting is on the rise elsewhere in the country too. Four years ago, only 1 per cent of seized fake notes were seen to be made using digital methods. By last year, 40 per cent of the seized notes were of the high-tech kind. "About half the time now," says a Secret Service spokesman, "we seize a computer."
Last year, about $14 million in counterfeit money was confiscated in the US, down from $30 million the year before. To combat the increasing use of digitised counterfeiting, the US Treasury Department has embarked on the redesign campaign, which costs four cents per bill. Some 640 million $5 notes and 492 million $10 notes will be printed. The new notes will feature:
A watermark of the presidential portrait visible from both sides when the note is held up to the light. A polymer security thread and a flag embedded vertically in the paper next to the portrait spelling out the denomination of the note. The flag and the denomination are visible under bright light, and the security thread glows a different colour when held under an ultraviolet light. A new universal seal of the Federal Reserve along with a letter added to the serial number of the note. All the new bills, except the $5 one, will contain a special embedded ink that turns different shades of green and black when the bill is held at different angles.Beware of phoney investment advisors
Hold your horses if you get investment advice over the telephone or through e-mail, promising a good return on an investment. In the US in particular, and throughout the world in general, scam artists are pushing hard phony investments, writes The Los Angeles Times. State regulators have warned investors to take a step back and ask a few questions before trusting their money to someone else.
If you get a call from a purported investment advisor or material over e-mail, say the regulators, first check his credentials with the appropriate agency to determine whether the salesperson is legitimate. Also, they say, probe deeply into how the offer will earn such high returns, for a high return usually requires taking on a high level of risk.
Don't take any offer without a back-up claim of documents outlining risks, legal authorisation and historical performance. Anyone can publish a slick brochure or put up an elegant site on the Internet. Check the legitimacy of the company making you the offer with the help of local libraries and the state regulators' directories of licensed investment advisors and legitimate firms.
Wireless Internet still premature
The wireless Internet still remains very primitive despite the hype of the wireless application protocol (WAP) in mobile communication, writes The Financial Times. The paper cited the UK's success last month in raising $35 billion by auctioning five national wireless communications licences. The bidders offer handsomely to secure radio spectrum blocks capable of carrying more bandwidth.
The 3G network, as it is called, promises to provide connectivity at up to two megabits per second, 200 times the speed of current systems. The network also has the potential to provide a mobile medium that operates as quickly as the T1 landlines, which many people use for their personal computers.
Compared with the slow-speed of fixed-lined communications, 3G promises a giant leap forward. A pan-European network of licences is likely to cost Euro 40 billion ($36.40 billion). Several governments-Italy, France and Ireland, in particular-are now reworking their plans for giving away the radio spectrum to mobile communication companies in the light of the UK's success. Big Brother USA has not yet designated any of its radio spectrums for 3G services, but it is planning two separate auctions this year for broadband wireless services.
All this may be good news for cash-starved governments, but the process entails huge risks for wireless companies, the paper writes. Telecom companies have little experience on which to base their bids for broadband licences, while the potential consumer as well as business applications of the new technology are still untested. The questions that remain are first, concerning the control of the portals trough which users will use to enter the wireless web and, second, concerning the nature of the services that wireless access to the Internet will foster.
Some mobile companies, like Vodafone, have decided to create their own WAP enable portal, while others are aligning themselves with some dominant portal companies like Yahoo! and America Online.
Mobile devices are not user-friendly for browsing or sending and receiving long e-mails. However, their portability makes them much more useful. According to Bruno DuCharme, chief executive of TIW, a Canadian company and a winner of the five UK licences, "Computers and other devices will eventually be able to "talk" to each other over this new medium: There will be no limit to the number of devices connected to this 24-hour mobile web." However, most of the new applications will not demand the large amounts of bandwidth promised by 3G. They will, instead, rely on an "always on" signal.
Depending on the technology, the new network will send data at speeds ranging from 114 kbps to 384 kbps, considerably faster than most PC-users get at the moment. In the US, companies such as Sprint plan to move to such networks later this year.
Copyright © 2000 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.