The mission of the Central Bank Counterfeit Deterrence Group (CBCDG) (originally designated as Special Study Group 2 or SSG-2 of the G10) is to investigate emerging threats to the security of

banknote A banknote—also called a bill (North American English), paper money, or simply a note—is a type of negotiable instrument, negotiable promissory note, made by a bank or other licensed authority, payable to the bearer on demand. Banknotes w ...

s and to propose solutions for implementation by issuing authorities. The CBCDG is a

working group A working group, or working party, is a group of experts working together to achieve specified goals. The groups are domain-specific and focus on discussion or activity around a specific subject area. The term can sometimes refer to an interdis ...

of 32

central bank A central bank, reserve bank, or monetary authority is an institution that manages the currency and monetary policy of a country or monetary union, and oversees their commercial banking system. In contrast to a commercial bank, a centra ...

s and note printing authorities, and is chaired by Thomas Jordan, the chairman of the

Swiss National Bank The Swiss National Bank (SNB; german: Schweizerische Nationalbank; french: Banque nationale suisse; it, Banca nazionale svizzera; rm, Banca naziunala svizra) is the central bank of Switzerland, responsible for the nation's monetary policy a ...

. The CBCDG maintains a website designed to advise the public about national laws related to the reproduction of banknotes. In 2004, CBCDG announced the development of a " Counterfeit Deterrence System" (CDS) incorporating a technical means for the detection of banknotes.Central banks and technology industry join to combat banknote counterfeiting
, Press release 9 March 2004. Accessed 2009-10-10. This system was reportedly developed by the U.S.-based

watermark A watermark is an identifying image or pattern in paper that appears as various shades of lightness/darkness when viewed by transmitted light (or when viewed by reflected light, atop a dark background), caused by thickness or density variations ...

technology company Digimarc. Adobe Systems was subsequently the subject of controversy in when it was revealed that the firm had voluntarily adopted the CDS in

Adobe Photoshop Adobe Photoshop is a raster graphics editor developed and published by Adobe Inc. for Windows and macOS. It was originally created in 1988 by Thomas and John Knoll. Since then, the software has become the industry standard not only in ras ...

, preventing Photoshop from processing some images of currency. Jasc (publisher of Paint Shop Pro) and Adobe stated that they had implemented CDS; they reportedly did not receive technical details of the CDS

algorithm In mathematics and computer science, an algorithm () is a finite sequence of rigorous instructions, typically used to solve a class of specific problems or to perform a computation. Algorithms are used as specifications for performing ...

(in other words, it was provided to them as a

black box In science, computing, and engineering, a black box is a system which can be viewed in terms of its inputs and outputs (or transfer characteristics), without any knowledge of its internal workings. Its implementation is "opaque" (black). The te ...

). Some artists and professional graphic designers suggested that the CDS would make it more difficult for them to use Photoshop to produce images that used currency in lawful ways.

Steven J. Murdoch Steven James Murdoch is Professor of Security Engineering in the Computer Science Department, University College London. His research covers privacy-enhancing technology, Internet censorship, and anonymous communication, in particular Tor. H ...

has begun a technical investigation of how the CDS works.Software Detection of Currency
www.cl.cam.ac.uk, Accessed 2009-10-10.

References

{{Reflist

External links

CBCDG official site
Money forgery

See also

References

External links