Beware these slick phonies
Counterfeiters using high-quality paper to print RM100 and RM50 notes
Technology is making it easier for counterfeiters to produce small quantities of authentic-seeming fake banknotes and pass them off to unsuspecting traders. Alarmingly, a currency expert claims that there is a general indifference towards screening for forgeries that helps them get away with it. At least the number of dud notes in circulation is low, according to Bank Negara, and severe penalties await forgers.
PETALING JAYA: Counterfeiters are using high-quality paper and state-of-the-art printers to produce fake RM100 and RM50 notes with up to 60% authenticity of genuine notes, a numismatist claimed.
Warisan Numismatic Malaysia
Club adviser Dickson Niew Cheng
Kok (pic) said the forgery gang members would then patronise small retail stores or sundry shops and buy small items with these notes, in return for actual currency as change from the unsuspecting proprietors.
“For example, they will use a dud RM100 note to buy a pack of cigarettes at the pasar malam and get about RM80 back in legal tender.
“They then either deposit the real cash in a bank or spend it, and of course print more fake notes,” he said in a recent interview over the incidence of fake notes being withdrawn from local and foreign banks over the years.
“However, they will eventually get caught if the place has an ultraviolet machine and their note is found to be fake.
“The suspect may be arrested and is liable to be jailed up to 20 years.”
According to Niew, there are near-perfect and hard-to-detect dud notes produced by counterfeiters in China, who have the technology to print fake currency that even money scanners cannot detect. He also said public apathy was one factor leading to the ease with which counterfeiters are able to disperse their forgeries into the economy.
Niew said his intention was to “educate people who take it for granted that the notes they carry are legal tender”, adding that many of us seldom bother to study currency notes to learn their distinguishing features.
“The problem is with feeling, scrutinising and detecting the security features of actual money, such as the texture and presence of watermarks,” he said at his antique coin and rare notes shop in Subang Jaya.
He added, however, that the number of such fake notes in circulation is rather low.
“But you must remember that it is the duty of citizens or large bodies to surrender these notes to Bank Negara even if they know they will not be reimbursed,” he stressed.
Random checks with retailers showed a general indifference towards spotting fake notes, although some retail chains make it standard operating procedure for their cashiers to check all RM50 and RM100 notes.
One pharmacy chain employee admitted that she seldom used the scanner provided by the company.
“If I detect any fake money, I usually ignore it. If I make an issue out of this, it will be bad for business. Besides, the money will never be reimbursed,” said the 32-year-old cashier.
Another cashier at a supermarket said there was not much point in having machines to scan and detect fake currency notes because “it sows distrust among our customers.”
“So what if you have fake money? No one will know,” he said.
Bank Negara did not respond to queries by press time.
alqadri@thestar.com.my