• Pons_Aelius@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    The reason this happens is to prevent counterfeiting money.

    From Snopes:

    Do Household Printers Leave an Invisible Tracking Code on All Your Printed Documents?

    Mostly true.

    What’s True

    Numerous brands of color laser printers leave coded metadata in barely perceptible yellow dots that can be used to trace a printed document to its source, a feature originally intended as a deterrent to counterfeiting currency with laser printers.

    What’s Undetermined

    While a majority of laser printers are designed to produce this secret metadata, it is unclear exactly how many printing companies and models employ the technology.

    • rustydomino@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Sure. That black and white hundred dollar bill I printed surely won’t pass scrutiny with the secret yellow dots.

      • Pons_Aelius@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        I didn’t say it made logical sense.

        The (US) law was passed: “All colour printers must include identifying metadata on every print”. So the printer manufactures went…sure, ok.

        • cannache@slrpnk.net
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          1 year ago

          The job of the government, pass dumb laws to prevent imaginary crimes, while the CIA secretly bangs your mum

      • 11181514@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        You can legally copy US currency in black and white because, like you suggested, it’s obviously not real. So if that’s the reason for the micro printing it wouldn’t be applicable on a black only laser printer. The original post is also not relevant to your situation at all anyway…