Re: Photocopying money

[Matthew J Ghio <mg5n+@andrew.cmu.edu>]

Edward J OConnell <ejo@world.std.com> wrote:

> I work at a graphic arts service bureau, and someone told me that
> they had seen a canon representative, with a straight face, say at a
> trade show that there was a chip in these machines that detected
> the pattern created by currency, and blocked out the image. 
>
> Easy to test. Of course, not true--at least, not the canon clc 300 I run.
>
> The control panel of the canon has a list of things you are not
> supposed to copy. That is the extent of the restriction. For some
> obscure reason I follow these rules. I'm not sure why.
>
> The chip thing made me laugh. What is amazing to me is that
> canon would try to create this easily disprovable myth. Has
> anyone else heard this story? My friend was adamant that he
> had heard this spiel (and not a friend of his) but I suppose
> this could itself be an urban myth. 
>
> I suppose I could call canon...but attracting that kind of
> attention to myself seems really stupid...

It's true.  Canon did indeed create such a chip.  It's the same chip
that's used in vending machines to scan dollar bills.  They built a
prototype copier which prevented copying money, but I don't know if they
actually decided to install the chip in all their assembly-line
production copiers or not tho.