Feds: Counterfeit Money Being Manufactured Using Everyday Office Equipment
Email
(Image Credit: ABC News)
Millions of counterfeit dollars are flooding cash registers, and more often than not, this “funny money” is being manufactured using everyday office equipment, federal authorities said.
Heath Kellogg, a graphic artist known as “The Printer,” his father and four other men were busted in November after authorities said the men produced more than a million dollars in counterfeit bills.
The operation was shockingly simple. Kellogg, who is a self-taught graphic artist, and his team, allegedly used a printer to produce the front of fake $50 bills and printed the back of the bills separately before carefully gluing it all together.
“It’s easier today because the technology has gotten so good and people can make better fakes,” said Brad Garrett, a former FBI agent and ABC News consultant.
How-to guides, easily found on the Internet, guide people through the counterfeiting process.
A Rhode Island man was arrested in November after he allegedly learned how to use a chemical soap to rub off the ink on $5 bills, turning them into counterfeit $100 bills.
Despite the flood of fakes, the government said new security features on money, such as color shifting numbers and portrait watermarks that show the same face that’s on the front of the bill, do make a difference.
RSS
Twitter
Facebook
since the Govt. is printing phony money, then it appears the citizens are also making the same phony$$$$$$$ ,,,,,
Posted by: west virginian | January 6, 2013, 7:31 pm 7:31 pm
“A Rhode Island man was arrested in November after he allegedly learned how to use a chemical soap to rub off the ink on $5 bills, turning them into counterfeit $100 bills.”
WHAT??? DOes this make sense to anyone?
Posted by: cygon | January 6, 2013, 9:41 pm 9:41 pm
ALMOST as worthless as the US MINT products. Stop it.
Posted by: Michael Boyd | January 6, 2013, 10:15 pm 10:15 pm
The Govt Prints “funny money” until the devalue the #### out of what we are carrying and what we are being paid, and it is legal……. Some Americans do it because they can’t get by on the “funny money” the Govt is printing, and it is illegal.
Posted by: dbase1986 | January 6, 2013, 11:08 pm 11:08 pm
I took my better-half to watch a movie this afternoon and after I slid a $50 bill under the window, the attendant walked to the side – only returned with a pen in her hand and she slid her pen across the $50 bill and apparently satisfied that it’s not a counterfeit – then she gave me back the tickets with the changes. I wasn’t worried at all – after all, I got the $50 bill from my bank earlier.
Posted by: Get_Down | January 6, 2013, 11:17 pm 11:17 pm
Good old internet, will give info on just about anything, won’t it? There needs to be a solution to this counterfeit problem, for if so many people are able to make millions of phony dollars then before long we will have all these fake “millionaires”. Then demand will certainly outstrip supplies very quickly and people with the real money won’t find nearly as much as they used to. Then even those with the fake money won’t have anywhere to use it due to depleted supplies. My oh my, what is going to happen to this thing called humanity? I’m afraid we’re all in for a wild ride in the future not even the Mayans predicted about.
Posted by: Debbie | January 7, 2013, 12:05 am 12:05 am
this is treason and should get the death penalty.
Posted by: joes | January 7, 2013, 12:39 am 12:39 am
How can it be counterfeit when the other is fiat and not real money to begin with.
Posted by: Seanoamericano | January 7, 2013, 1:20 am 1:20 am
““A Rhode Island man was arrested in November after he allegedly learned how to use a chemical soap to rub off the ink on $5 bills, turning them into counterfeit $100 bills.”
WHAT??? DOes this make sense to anyone?”
Yes. Removed the ink from a $5 bill, then printed the image for a $100 in it’s place. Instant $95 profit. New dollar on the correct paper, but a whole host of security features that would fail to check out.
Posted by: Todd | January 7, 2013, 7:19 am 7:19 am
What difference does it make if no one knows it is a fake?
Posted by: darthzavros | January 7, 2013, 7:38 am 7:38 am
“What difference does it make if no one knows it is a fake?”
1) Anyone who has handled money for any significant amount of time can usually spot a fake bill without even looking at it. Even ones made by the chemical soap process. There is a specific texture generated by the combination of paper and ink and after a while it becomes remarkably easy to tell the difference.
2) The difference it makes is that the more bills there are in circulation, the less each individual bill is worth. Thus, a massive influx of bills, legitimate OR counterfeit, would reduce the bills’ value to zero.
Posted by: AmericaThePitiful | January 7, 2013, 4:30 pm 4:30 pm