Statistics show counterfeiting has grown to become a $535 billion a year industry, and it’s expected to grow to $1.3 trillion by 2010. Counterfeiters are increasingly targeting high-value brands in the technology and electronics sector, as well as apparel, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and automotive parts.
This month’s mystery product is a solution previously reserved for secure identification documents, such as passports and drivers licenses, that is now available to the commercial marketplace. It also adds an eye-catching feature to products and packaging.
Use the following clues to try to guess what the product is:
• It is a multi-layered security system featuring both overt and covert attributes.
• It incorporates innovative floating and/or sinking graphic elements.
• Its visible security features can be easily verified with or without the use of a tool.
mystery product revealed
Headquartered in St. Paul, Minn., 3M introduced a revolutionary new high-security, multi-layered, anti-counterfeiting label. The 3M Confirm Floating Image Security Label uses advanced holographic technology to make an image rise, sink and disappear. Based on 3M’s patented and proprietary retroreflective technology, the label adds an eye-catching, optically variable device (OVD) that is easy to verify without using an authentication tool.
The high-security solution also adds brand enhancement or a “wow-factor” to products and packaging. The OVD is a customized translucent gray image that seems to float above or sink below the surface of the label and appears to move in all directions as the viewing angle is changed. The overt images also disappear when tilted on a large angle in any direction, adding another level of security and ease of authentication.
The bright, retroreflective background and custom pattern make attempts to counterfeit or tamper obvious to the viewer, and can be verified even in poor lighting conditions.
For more information, visit www.3m.com/security.
Visit www.bfls.com/infocenter and enter #200.
- Companies:
- 3M Promotional Markets Department