What is Counterfeit Money

Counterfeit money is currency produced outside the legal sanction of a government, usually in a deliberate attempt to imitate currency and to deceive its recipient. Counterfeit money is a form of fraud or forgery, and is illegal across the world. The business of counterfeiting money is one of the oldest forms of fraud: plated copies (known as Fourrées) have been found of Lydian coins, which are thought to be among the first Western coins.

Now with the introduction of paper money, counterfeiting as a whole has also changed. While early forms of money were more vulnerable to replication, now with modern tools counterfeiters have evolved into using things such as high resolution scanners. Today, some of the most realistic counterfeit banknotes are called Superdollars because of their high quality and imitation of the real US dollar. There has been significant counterfeiting of Euro banknotes and coins since the launch of the currency in 2002, but considerably less than that of the US dollar.

Counterfeit Money on the Society

Counterfeiting has had many ill effects on society which include a reduction in the value of real money; an increase in prices (inflation) as a result of an increase in money being circulated in the economy—an unauthorized artificial increase in the money supply; a decrease in the acceptability of paper money; and losses, when traders are not reimbursed for counterfeit money detected by banks, even if it is confiscated.