Detecting Counterfeit Money

With some of the recent appearances of counterfeit money in our community, education on how to detect a counterfeit bill is unfortunately necessary. It’s not only important for businesses and cash handlers to know how to detect a bad bill, but for individuals as well, as counterfeit money is not reimbursable if you accept it.

With current technology, creating counterfeit money is easier than ever. The most common denomination counterfeited is a $20 and $100. Other denominations are counterfeited, but not as often.

The use of counterfeit detection pens has become an outdated source of detection, due to the numerous ways enterprising counterfeiters have found to get around the problem.

A few of the simplest ways to detect a counterfeit bill are:

1. Every bill denomination greater than $2 has color-shifting ink on the lower right corner on the front side- tilt the bill back and forth and it will turn copper to green, or black to green.

2. Serial numbers on fake bills tend to be noticeably brighter or darker than the rest of the bill, as well as misaligned.

3. The portraits on the front (and on some older bills on the area around them) have very fine curved lines running along them.

4. Every modern U.S. currency contains a water mark security feature.  By holding the bill up to the light you should be able to see a water mark next to the portrait of the president on the bill. The portrait of the president and the watermark portrait need to match.

The U.S. Secret Service advise several things if you find yourself in receipt of counterfeit money: Do not give the counterfeit money back to the person who gave it to you. If you can safely do so, try and keep the individual with you while someone else calls the local police. If the individual leaves, contact the local authorities as soon as possible with as much detail as possible regarding the person and their vehicle. In the outer edge of the bill write your initials and the date received. Lastly, handle it as little as possible and place in a protective envelope or plastic bag to protect potential evidence.

Identifying counterfeit currency is not a terribly difficult task. When a person knows what to look for, identifying genuine from fraudulent can be done with great accuracy. Awareness and education is always the best way to protect ourselves from crime, be it scams, burglaries or counterfeit money.