True Conspiracy You Probably Didn't Know: Secret Printer Fingerprint

Inspired by some other GC Conspiracy posters I wanted to share this. It never got big attention when it was discovered last October but I thought it was pretty interesting.

Basically, on request of the good old US government, almost all big pritner manufacturers agreed to put a hidden fingerprint on every sheet of printed paper that contains the printer serial number and a date and time stamp of when it rolled out of the printer. Considering you have to register your hardware if you want any support, this basically means they can trace your every sheet back to you.

Here's the full story:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/18/AR2005101801663.html

Just make sure you own a good shredder and don't print dodgy stuff.

I wonder, would the barcode show on scans of the print out with image manipulation?

 

This is been know for quite some while now even before last october

Want to decode the code?

Here is how http://www.eff.org/Privacy/printers/docucolor/

 

I never knew about that. Woow! I wonder if my printer is spying on me as well.

 

This is exactly why I make my ransom notes by cutting letters out from magazines.

 

I ask kindergarten students to write mine.

 

This has been around for over 10 years now. It is not only printers, copy machines and fax machines have it also.

 

Wth! That doesn't sound legal, shouldn't there be some sort of disclaimer for that? I wonder if it's for real, Ima go check some copies on my desk.

 

Its true, I saw it on CSI the other week. A show of fake detectives is enough for me to believe.