It’s so they can print the tracking dots.
For the unaware: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/household-printers-tracking-code/
Wow, I had no idea. I thought the joke was needing full ink in an unrelated color. I didn’t know about tracking. I’m sadly unsurprised.
It’s for the purpose of serialization for counterfeit purposes. Also, high end copiers have a device installed called the BDU (Bill Detection Unit) that all scans pass through before being post processed. If the BDU detects a bill being scanned it can error and shut down the whole device until the manufacturer can send someone out to fix it. I used to be one of those people resetting BDUs at schools where a teacher thought it was a good idea to copy images of money for teaching students.
feature originally intended as a deterrent to counterfeiting currency with laser printers.
Honestly, the USA is something special. So they do this, instead of putting modern anticounterfit (like polimer notes with transparencies) measures onto their notes.
consumers will not notice any difference in the performance or effectiveness of products equipped with this technology.
I believe they missed this part of the memo
Hold up… Was “Reality Winner” the name of an individual or a business? Like, I was stunned by the fact the yellow dots thing is a thing, but then it starts talking about “Reality Winner” and I can’t move on until I know what’s up with that name. lol
She is a former NSA translator who sent some classified documents to The Intercept. The Intercept failed to redact the document properly allowing the NSA to view identifying marks on the printout and track her down. I believe she has been release from prison.
They also use microscopic yellow dot patterns. Black and white only prints use a microscopic grey print pattern at the print boundary. The technique is a form of steganography. They aren’t tracking you btw. It gets used primarily to investigate fraud. Printer companies do it primarily because if they don’t, their brand will become associated with print related crimes. There are lists of printers that do not do steganographic serialization but those machines are almost entirely too poor quality to produce any convincing counterfeits anyways.
That’s how it always starts though.
People use any device or service they want. It’s a mix of crooks, tinkerers, journalists, etc.
A company or government makes some moral panic and pushes some privacy or civil rights erosion in the name of “security”. The actual security benefit may or may not exist.
Then other companies do the same to keep up.
Then there’s only a handful of companies not doing the thing, so anyone who doesn’t want their privacy or civil rights eroded uses that, including crooks.
Then politicians and the other companies point to the holdouts as “PROOF!” their changes were good, because look how many crooks use that stuff! (The number of crooks hasn’t changed, they’ve just been concentrated to a single location.) The moral panic deepens.
The non-criminal population that cares about their privacy or civil rights speak out, but get accused of secretly being criminals, or some other crap that can be used to dismiss their concerns. “If you have nothing to hide, why are you so upset?” and all that.
Now laws get passed to force all companies to do the same thing, to stop the criminals! But let’s not worry about anyone else. The tinkerers, journalists, privacy-advocates, etc. They don’t matter.
The law gets passed, and now all toasters are legally required to record your breakfast conversations, for a silly example.
My wife found a black and white Brother laser MFP at Goodwill for $15 and it has been an absolute game changer for us.
After losing my third or fourth shitty inkjet since college in a recent move, I needed to print something and found myself once again browsing the Staples flyer.
Eventually decided to spend a bit more up front and just got a Brother color laser.
Now it sits there quietly in the corner for months at a time, doing nothing, until I need it, at which point it is always ready, fast, and has great print quality.
Picked up a refurbished laser printer at a garage sale 8 years ago. I still haven’t had to change the ink cartridges
I found a small Dell B1160W at Goodwill for $5 new in box! Best little printer I’ve ever had and I’m still on the original toner cartridge. My only gripe is that it’s wireless or USB. Would love to have wired LAN, but for $5 I can’t complain!
Ha jokes on you, I’ll just call HP Painters instead! 😜
Why would you paint a house brick?
Just call Brother painters and they will give your house a powder coat for 1/10th the cost!
](https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/32428976-43db-403a-a1ba-28b7d5886875.png){kind=link}
Thank you for calling HP Painters! We would be happy to complete your painting job for the low, low price of $200! That’s the up-front cost, then just a small subscription of $100/month on a 10-year contract.
Thanks again for calling, you can send in your deposit of your first born child to
HP Painting & Blood Extraction Services
666 Hells Way
Gary IN 46407
And you have to buy them yellow paint NOT because they ran out, but because it got caked in the hose and clogged it up.