New Features Sought for US Currency

The design of the next generation of US currency is underway, and the Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP) is now looking for new ways to integrate covert machine-readable features into future versions that could be used to detect and deter counterfeiting. To this end, it has recently issued an RFI (Request for Information).

According to the RFI, the BEP wants novel and innovative systems incorporated in or applied to a banknote that not only are hard to identify even by subject matter experts, but also difficult to explain. Any feature, once incorporated into the currency, should be readable only by a sensitive, stand-alone detection system and be resistant to simulation or duplication.

The BEP says it will only consider technologies, materials and detection systems that have already been demonstrated (as proofs of concept or lab prototypes, for example), but will not consider features or systems that are already commercially-available.

Materials and technologies will be reviewed for their relative effectiveness as security features as well as for their compatibility with the BEP’s design and production factors, durability standards and environmental acceptability.

For initial screening purposes, interested parties are requested to submit preliminary samples and a brief technical description to the BEP. These may be provided to outside technical experts under government contracts for their evaluation. Any previously submitted materials or technologies need not be resubmitted.

Responses are due by 31 August. The full RFI can be found here: sam.gov/opp/774c8a61ddfa4b218caf40eb7ec8d1e7/view.