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New $5 bill aims to thwart counterfeiters

Redesign seeks to stop criminals who have been bleaching old $5 bills and printing images of $100 bills over them.

from the September 20, 2007 edition

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Despite the relatively small amount of counterfeit money, "redesigns are necessary to preserve trust and confidence in American currency," says Stephen Mihm, a history professor at the University of Georgia and the author of "A Nation of Counterfeiters." Each redesign raises the stakes, putting some counterfeiters out of business, he says.

The five's makeover will not be as dramatic, though, as next year's $100. That note will features 650,000 lenses, creating the illusion that the images on the bill are moving as you move the bill from side to side or up and down. This easy-to-spot feature should go a long way toward halting counterfeit money from passing through more hands, experts say. But redesigns only work if people know what the new, authentic currency is supposed to look like.

"Public education is the most important way to stop counterfeits," says Blackford.

In that vein, the new $5 bill's "Wi-5" unveiling will occur online through a webcast of officials explaining the new bill at 9 a.m. EDT on Sept. 20. An interactive press conference will follow the webcast, with reporters typing in questions and officials responding live on camera. This webcast as well as the first images of the $5 bill are available at www.moneyfactory.gov/newmoney. Video interviews with members of the public talking about the new bill and finding the new security features will also appear on the site this week. The hope is the technique will attract a broader audience, Blackford says.

To learn to spot a fake, you can also go to www.secretservice.gov/know_your_money.shtml. Anyone who thinks they've received a counterfeit note, Blackford says, should call their local police or Secret Service field office.

Among the latest anticounterfeiting efforts is the development of a chemical, spectroscopic signature, Professor Mihm says. It would help identify if a bill was created in specific conditions and with a certain kind of paper, making it nearly impossible to replicate. A machine would then be able to look for that kind of money "fingerprint," he says, and detect fakes easily, quickly, and definitively.

From a historical perspective, counterfeiting is a minor issue today. Before the Civil War, 10 to 15 percent of money in circulation was fake, Mihm says. This high percentage stems from the fact that the government only started to print an official US currency in order to pay for the Civil War. Before then, approximately 10,000 currencies were used in the US, Mihm says. "People had a hard enough time remembering what the different currencies were supposed to look like, let alone recognizing counterfeits," he says.

In 1865, the US Secret Service was created within the Treasury Department to suppress counterfeiting. But it took until the early 1900s before the service could bring the percentage of counterfeits down to today's level. The amount of counterfeit currency has also gone up and down depending on economic and political circumstances, Mihm says. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, counterfeiting increased dramatically as the threat of imprisonment was less worrisome than paying for the basic requirements of life.

The 1990s also saw an increase in counterfeits as efforts to imitate US currency became international. In fact, Americans should be more worried if no one wanted to counterfeit their money, Mihm says.

"Whenever a currency is counterfeited it's a sign of desirability. Should the dollar cease to be the currency of choice, then you would see a drop in counterfeiting," Mihm says.

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