According to statistics of customs seizures of counterfeited goods, tobacco products and especially cigarette packets are first in line. At World Tobacco Expo 2011 in Munich, 8-10 November, AlpVision, the world’s leader in digital invisible technologies for product authentication and counterfeit protection, will showcase its Cryptoglyph® invisible marking, which is achieved by including invisible holes in the varnish layer. This marking does not modify the printing process in any way; it only requires a digital manipulation at the prepress level.
The resulting marking is totally invisible to the naked eye and impossible to counterfeit. Billions of cigarette packets are protected every year by AlpVision’s product authentication digital solution.
The ‘Genuine-or-Fake’ verification is achieved using a standard office flatbed scanner. But when a large number of verifications is required, AlpVision delivers its ‘Black Horn’ detection means using off-the-shelf USB microscope and a ‘Genuine-or-Fake’ verification software allowing up to 15 detections per second.
The authentication operation is intuitive; just pass the ‘Black Horn’ over the box and the software beeps to indicate that authentication has occurred. The speed and ease of this operation is similar to the reading of a barcode with a laser reader. In addition, the system also recovers the printer and batch information hidden in Cryptoglyph®.
To find out more please contact AlpVision or visit the company’s stand at World Tobacco Expo 2011 (stand #B52).