CFP: Discovering that your new designer handbag or gold watch is a fake is costly and annoying, and counterfeit medical devices or drugs could have even more serious consequences. But seemingly as soon as manufacturers develop a new method to ensure product authenticity, counterfeiters find a way to outsmart it. Now, researchers have created an “unclonable” tag that can never be replicated, even by the manufacturer. They report their results in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.
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Each year, counterfeit goods cost billions of dollars in economic losses. These knock-offs, typically of inferior quality, often masquerade as luxury brands. Manufacturers have tried to incorporate unique tags or bar codes on their products so that store owners and consumers can verify a product’s authenticity, but counterfeiters often figure out how to copy these. Riikka Arppe-Tabbara, Mohammad Tabbara and Thomas Just Sørensen wanted to develop an authentication system using physical unclonable functions (PUFs) –– tags based on random processes that are impossible to replicate. As they explain in their report, an example of a PUF would be throwing a handful of sand on a surface. Each throw generates a random pattern that cannot be copied. more here
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Because we all know if those accessories aren’t real Prada, life isn’t worth living.
It’s not what you buy, it’s where.
PUF the Magic Taggin’?
I buy T shirts at Walmart.
Nobody ever cloned one before.
I read that the Chinese were/are cloning 20 dollar German pens and blowing the market all to pieces. It’s mind boggling to me that they would go to all that effort for 15 dollars a pen, but I guess 15 honkey dollars is a fortune good enough to tool up for the counterfeiting job.
The even more screwed up part is they could make just as much money for non counterfeit pens like Jinhaos which are very well made cheap fountain pens.
Ain’t no such thing as an unbreakable lock. It may be more difficult and take longer but it will happen and they’ll have to come up with another ‘unbreakable’ lock.
“… counterfeit goods cost billions of dollars in economic losses.”
Really?
Just because the high-end retailer doesn’t get the dough doesn’t mean that there are “economic losses” – in fact, there are “economic gains” for the counterfeiters. Pretty sure that’s why they counterfeit in the first place.
They’re calling money NOT made as money LOST.
I’ve seen TV reno shows where some guy asks “Is that hardwood?” or “Is that granite?” Well, if you don’t know, it don’t matter.
(not implying that it’s not criminal)
izlamo delenda est …