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03/02/2004 Archived Entry: "About those new 20 dollar bills..."
About those new 20 dollar bills...
This is interesting - the RFID tags they're putting into the new bills set off some anti-theft alarms, and they explode in a microwave.
Want to share an event with you, that we experienced this evening.. Dave had over $1000 dollars in his back pocket (in his wallet). New twenties were the lion share of the bills in his wallet. We walked into a truck stop/travel plaza and they have those new electronic monitors that are supposed to say if you are stealing something. But through every monitor, Dave set it off. He did not have anything to purchase in his hands or pockets. After numerous times of setting off these monitors, a person approached Dave with a 'wand' to swipe why he was setting off the monitors.Believe it or not, it was his 'wallet'. That is according to the minimum wage employees working at the truck stop! We then walked across the street to a store and purchased aluminum foil. We then wrapped our cash in foil and went thru the same monitors. No monitor went off.
Nice touch, placing the chip in Andy Jackson's eye...
Replies: 10 people speak up
Well of course. That is so they can catch Americans who are carrying illegal amounts of cash. Haven’t you heard? Anyone who carries $1000 in cash is either a drug dealer, or a terrorist. Good patriotic Americans use credit cards. I guarantee you, if you get pulled over by the cops, and you have $1000 on you in cash, you are going to jail, and your money is going into the police general fund. It happens all the time, they call it "illegal use of US currency” its a favorite tactic of southern cops to arrest minorities when they don’t have any other evidence. Now they can find all that money with a wand, they don’t have to even search your car. I bet it shows up on airport security systems too. Hell at this point I wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t have a 2 way radio transmitter in it too, but that, I admit, is just indulging in paranoia.
Posted by justin @ 03/02/2004 11:14 AM NY
Justin,
Simple solution: exchange your Jacksons for Hamiltons and buy a bigger wallet.
Looks like those six years of night school getting my MBA wasn't a complete waste of time after all.
Posted by Metropolitan99 @ 03/02/2004 12:17 PM NY
There's a lot of buzz about this case online today. I've yet to see proof that it's RFID. Personally I believe there might be other metallic components in the banknotes, not necessarily RFID tags.
There are some more comments on it over here:
http://www.rfidbuzz.com/news/2004/rfid_tags_in_new_us_notes_explode_when_you_try_to_microwave_them.html
http://www.rfidbuzz.com/news/2004/rfid_in_us_postage_stamps_dollar_bills.html
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=98942&cid=8437731
http://thraxil.org/nodes/5027
The full story will certainly be updated here as soon as intependent source(s) confirm/debunk the claims:
http://www.rfidbuzz.com/wiki/Actors/InternalRevenueService
(it's a Wiki - you can update it too! :-) )
Posted by Anders @ 03/02/2004 02:06 PM NY
dont worry though, we can still warm up our money the old fashioned way (by letting it burn a hole in our pockets) i wonder, if we just microwave them on low for a longer time would it damage the tracking devices enough to render them inert? i used to take the tracking strips out of my money with a razor blade, just a small scratch at the top and it slides right out. something perversely fun about making money valueless and then spending it on pizza...
Posted by justin @ 03/02/2004 02:56 PM NY
by the way, metropolitan, i dont really have enough money at any time to set off an anti theft device anyway. forget about jacksons and hamiltons, im lucky if i have a washington or a lincoln most of the time. my wallet is full of useless crap, like $22 bills with some crazy guy from florida named love22 on them, and discount cards from supermarkets, not to mention my long unused scuba certification card. if nothing else i could use a smaller wallet, with more money and less crap in it.
Posted by justin @ 03/02/2004 03:00 PM NY
Arrggghhh, Justin! Back to the same old crap again? Am I going to have to call up an English intervention on you by your friends and neighbors to get you to post properly?
Posted by Stentor @ 03/02/2004 04:18 PM NY
Hey Stentor, Justin doesn't post "incorrectly". His posts are on-topic and relevant, which is more than I can say for yours.
Posted by The Tater @ 03/02/2004 04:43 PM NY
"Looks like those six years of night school getting my MBA WEREN'T (not "wasn't") a complete waste of time after all."
After whining about my MBA, you'd think I would use the correct verb tense. Hell, it was in Finance, not English. Is our children learning? Apparently not me.
Justin: give me a million Washingtons (or 200,000 Lincolns) and I'd be happy.
Stentor: a Greek herald in the Trojan War noted for his loud voice. I wonder what became of him?
Posted by Metropolitan99 @ 03/02/2004 05:18 PM NY
hell, right now, even a few hundred washingtons would be of great help to me. im going back to college (visual communications, this time) and its so damn expensive. now i will have 2 college degrees, and stentor will still give me shit. oh well
just give me a couple thousand washingtons, or just one roosevelt in the white house, and ill be a happy man.
Posted by justin @ 03/02/2004 06:11 PM NY
Unless I'm badly mistaken the so called "new bills" that were tested were actually old bills devoid of RFID tags. The burning that took place was more than likely due to the concentration of dark ink near the eye.
Posted by Thurber Hamm @ 03/03/2004 03:00 PM NY
