Movie or prop money used to be something of an inside joke. It came about because of the risk of accounting for massive amounts of cash on filming sets when it was required as part of a script.

Producers realized that it was smarter to make paper props that looked like real money from afar but bear no overt similarity to the real thing up close. Few viewers knew anything about the substitutions, until the internet changed everything. Something that was unknown and hard to get is now ubiquitous — so much so that Crane Currency, a leading producer of real money, is calling attention to it. It says on its website, “Today, movie and prop money is widely and cheaply promoted via the internet — and this has opened up whole new fields of opportunity for cons, criminals and counterfeiters.”

Crane calls movie money and holograms a dangerous combination. As popular as holograms are as a security feature on many valid bank notes, the company draws a distinction between the anti-counterfeiting measures it provides to central banks (such as its micro-optic 3D security called “Motion”) and the cheaper, deceptive ploys such as shiny foils and stick-on holograms that Crane says have the potential to trick the public into accepting a fake bank note as real. It says, “The combination of movie money and holograms therefore creates the risk of highly deceptive counterfeits that are relatively easy to make.”

Nick Pearson, principal currency technologist at Crane Currency, says, “Movie money is not highly deceptive. The problem starts when the internet compels thousands of consumers to purchase them on a whim and then hundreds of thousands of fake notes are now out there. At this point, it becomes a certainty that some will be passed off as genuine. And more nefariously, someone will start using them as a convenient starting point for making counterfeits that can be very deceptive.”

Crane Marketing Director Tod Niedeck reinforced the gravity of the situation. “When something we know is wrong, but easy to do or acquire, we are good at rationalizing that it is okay. We talk a great deal about security features for banknotes that are designed to prevent counterfeiting, but we need to talk more about how the internet is changing things.”

He added, “Just as the internet popularized downloading copyrighted music, the same popularization of holding movie money and even taking the steps to improve it by applying stick-on holograms has to be considered. In the past, the materials and know-how needed to create fake banknotes was shared between criminals and countered by law enforcement. Today the materials, ‘hacks’ and even the idea of creating counterfeits are broadcast online.”The notes are often called counterfeits in the media, but it is not illegal to own them given that the differences with real money are obvious. However, it is not legal to try to spend them.

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