Cracking Down on Counterfeit Cash

The commonly-used marker to detect counterfeit money doesn't work on bleached bills.

The Secret Service, the agency which investigates counterfeiting, reports removing more than twice as many fake bills from circulation in fiscal year 2009 compared to the year before.

But around Houston, Cynthia Marble, Secret Service Assistant Special Agent in Charge, says only a specific kind of counterfeiting is on the rise.

"It's what we call bleaching a note, which is taking a lower denomination, bleaching it and printing over it with a higher denomination," she says.

The commonly-used marker to detect counterfeit money doesn't work on bleached bills. We now have the C-3310 automatic bill counterfeit detector. This infrared device actually displays the proper denomination of the bills and keeps a running count of bills checked by value.
Check it out here