This may have already been discussed but it's new to me. I just got a new smart phone (better than the Iphone 4S) and found a free app that can scan PCGS slabs. Now I'm curious if the bar code on a counterfeit PCGS slab would be accurate enough to fool the scanner? I know the good fakes will match the correct number from a previous online auction with the right coin date and mintmark, be it a real or fake coin. But I wonder if they can accurately reproduce the bar code from a photo off of ebay or Heritage to where it could trick this scanner? Does anybody know if there is an NGC app as well? This should be a helpful feature to have at coin shows. All you have to do to check one is tap and open the app on the phone. It turns the front viewfinder on and puts a long, narrow, clear box on the screen with a red line through the middle. You hold the slab in front of the phone and back it up until the whole bar code fits in the box. Once you get it just right, the red line which is flashing rapidly, slows down and will stop and lock on it. Then it immediately/automatically looks the coin up off the web and brings up all of the coin's info including the correct serial number on the slab. Works on old and new slabs. It also automatically finds multiple recent online auctions where one has sold. It tells you how many auctions it found. 16 in this instance. Gives what the average sale price has been, the highest sale price and the four lowest sale prices. Then there's also a button at the bottom you can click to go straight to current ebay auctions of that coin. Or you can click on more details and see the dates and sale prices of all the recently ended auctions it found. The phone runs on a 1 Ghtz, dual core processor so it brings this stuff up in about 5 seconds or less. It's almost as fast as my DSL cable at home.
This is a good start. I have been thinking about learning to code for Android however with work I haven't had the time. I can't wait to see more apps like this.
The better Chinese fakes we are seeing today have bar codes consistent with the PCGS coin#, grade, and cert#. So it won't be any help in detecting counterfeits. Counterfeits from years ago were shoddy and the bar code would give it away but it didn't take any great skill to know from just looking at the coin that it was fake. Lance.
It did just read the bar code off the computer screen from an ebay auction. So I suppose it depends on how they're producing the labels whether it would show up or not. Maybe it's easy to fool it. It will catch one that is screwed up but not an exact duplicate, obviously. The TPGs are almost going to have to come up with their own unique paper like they've had to do with currency, that is a secret formula and difficult to duplicate.
Vess, maybe give this a shot. Scroll down just past NGC 17X here NGC Slab Varieties Conder101 posted some clear pics of a Counterfeit label side by side the genuine one. The counterfeit barcode looks a little thinner in places, but overall it looks close. -Edit forgot only PCGS slabs. I'll have one in a min. PCGS- http://0.tqn.com/d/coins/1/0/z/C/-/-/counterfeit_pcgs_slabs_sbs_1200.jpg http://coins.about.com/od/coingrading/ig/Fake-PCGS-Slab-Diagnostics/
It's an Android phone. Found it at the Amazon Appstore. It's in there with 100 others and it was free.
PCGS Barcodes are a simple ITF (interleaved 2 of 5) bar code. They are not complicated and they are not difficult to create using free software. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interleaved_2_of_5
There are a number of iPhone/iPad apps that do the same thing. UniReader; LetScan; i-nigma; Scanit; ATTScanner - all free. Some of these work on other code types too, such as QR Codes, Data Matrix and Microsoft Code.
