Category: Trends in Technology

PICO secure™: Next-Gen Optical Security for Embedded Document Security

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Author: Haleigh Winters

View in PDF format here.

Why are PICO secure™ OVDs Easy to Identify by Frontline Law Enforcement and Border Control?

Authentication and visual confirmation of travel documents upon crossing borders is of utmost importance for national security. Optical Variable Devices are part of a larger set of standardized security features across countries to protect and verify identity documents. Their optical characteristics are designed to be easily detectable by border control officers without the need for specialized equipment. The combination of OVDs and other security features forms a robust defense against forgery and enhances the security of international travel.

The Importance of OVDs in Identity Documents

Optical Variable Devices (OVDs) are crucial for government document inspectors and passport border control personnel due to their ability to provide a unique and non-replicable identifier for each document. OVDs are embedded in a secure substrate and can change effects, colors or patterns on tilt or under different light conditions. Legacy solutions like holograms, color changing inks, stamps, and UV dull paper are commercially available, can be harvested and widely used by counterfeiters to create fakes.

There is a need for next generation optical security features that are always on, visible in multiple lighting conditions and look completely different from any attempted counterfeits, that are easy to identify by frontline law enforcement, airport border controls and inspectors. Their proprietary algorithms and specialized manufacturing techniques make it impossible for counterfeiters to replicate the features accurately, thus reducing the risk of fraud and ensuring the integrity of security features.

PICO secure: A Breakthrough in Embedded Document Security

Developed by Authentix, PICO secure is the first nano-optic, plasmonic OVD in the market offering always-on-structural color and movement. This is a major advancement in document security – the first successful integration of nano-optic plasmonic structures into polycarbonate, unlocking a new class of overt, intuitive, and tamper-resistant security for national ID cards and passports. PICO secure represents a new era of overt document security, where light itself becomes the protective mechanism.

This is the next generation of identity document security as it provides high engagement and enhances any document theme with highly customizable, intuitive authentication effects. Pure plasmonic color pixels patterned on ultra-thin microstructures create ‘always-on’ effects that are unique, simple to understand, memorable, and highly secure for document authentication.

Why Officers Can Verify PICO secure at a Glance

  • High Visibility – Complete customization of multi-color design and effects that are visible even in low lighting conditions.
  • Dual Sided Protection – Effects are viewable from both sides through a window, securing two sides of the document.
  • Ease of Authentication – Simple, intuitive effects – Hide & reveal, depth, photo realism – with unambiguous and consistent colour.
  • Ultimate Integration – Can be applied on all substrates like polycarbonate, paper, composite or polymer with unmodified industry equipment – and can be further customised using typical laser personalisation techniques.

The Future of Embedded Document Security

Secure identity is a cornerstone of national trust. Traditional and aging OVD technologies used in many identity documents today, such as holograms and diffractive optical elements, rely primarily on diffraction and interference effects. While effective, these technologies have become increasingly vulnerable to counterfeiting due to advances in fabrication techniques now becoming more widely available.

Surface plasmon-based OVDs like PICO secure offer several advantages including extreme sensitivity to fabrication parameters, complex multi-parameter dependencies, and the ability to create effects that are fundamentally impossible to properly replicate without precise nanoscale control. The integration leverages the inherent thinness and stability of the nano-structured film, enabling:

  • Durable, tamper-evident embedding during lamination
  • Window integration with effects visible from both sides
  • Laser personalization compatibility for enhanced document-level trust

This level of integration ensures the feature is not surface-applied or added post-production, but bonded into the core of the document, delivering true security-by-design. It provides high public engagement and enhances any document theme with highly customizable, intuitive authentication effects. Contact one of Authentix OVD experts today to request samples to learn more about using this Nano Optic technology for your next security document, passport or national identity card.

Strengthening Our Systems to Better Protect Yours

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Author: Kathryn Olivier

Thank you to SAP and Seidor for featuring Authentix in a recent success story detailing our journey to harness the power of SAP Business ByDesign for real-time insights, accurate reporting and consistent data across our rapidly growing organization.

 

Elevating Your Brand Protection Strategy with Multilayered Security Solutions

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Author: Kathryn Olivier

By: Jeff Conroy, Chief Scientist, Authentix

Many companies are thinking more broadly about how to implement coordinated anti-counterfeiting, anti-diversion strategies across their brands and throughout different regions of the world. Just as tamper-evident seals on bottles of pills and liquid formulations became more common due to a tampering scare in the 1980s, attitudes toward anti-counterfeiting technologies are beginning to evolve.

Once viewing such measures narrowly as an “extra feature” that only “added cost” to the bottom line, brand owners are beginning to realize the importance of protecting the integrity of their brands and the most important part of the equation: protecting the safety of consumers. As serialization technologies continue to evolve, the tracking of individual units through the supply chain could enable very secure and traceable evidence of authentic products being supplied by manufacturers and distributors to end users.

Different Features, Different Purpose

Anti-counterfeiting features that can authenticate products are both overt and covert, and they can be applied in numerous ways: on labels, onto closure seals, on cartons where containers of products are stored, into plastic parts of individual packaging, and even onto metal and glass components of packaging.

The different types of features all serve a different purpose, from enabling end users to quickly identify a branded product as genuine, to covert markings that enable a manufacturer or inspector to identify the source of diversion or other illicit activity. When combined with the careful design and production quality controls used in authentic product manufacturing, these features raise the bar of complexity for counterfeiters and make the product a less attractive target.

With that said, it’s worth considering the value of individual security features versus a multilayered approach.

Overt security features

Visible security features serve a valuable purpose in the authentication stack. They offer a way for individuals to inspect packaging without any specialized tools, and the specialized color-shifting inks (similar to those used on currency) are often difficult to reproduce using scanners or reprographic methods. There are other types of optically variable features as well, including holograms, micro-optics (like the blue stripe found on the current US $100 bill), and reflective features.

Visible security features are a starting point, but counterfeiters are extremely creative and clever. Even if a visible authentication feature is hard to recreate perfectly, a counterfeiter only needs to copy it closely enough to confuse a consumer who just gives a package a quick glance. Additional features create layers of security.

Covert security features

High security covert features can be embedded into labels, closure seals, or other features of product packaging. Although such markers are invisible to the naked eye, they can be detected using specialized handheld surface spectrophotometers. Field instruments use proprietary excitation and detection optics and detection algorithms for rapid, secure field authentication. Additional forensic layers of security are also embedded into the materials and can be confirmed through more extensive laboratory analysis. This additional layer of security proves very difficult for the counterfeiter, but easily verified by field inspectors.

Serialization

In the serialization process, a company marks individual units at the point of manufacture (giving each a unique serial number) and implements stations to read those markings, capture the tracking data, and drop that information into a managed database that allows authorized personnel to monitor where products go after they leave the manufacturing facility. You’re probably most familiar with this process as it applies to shipping a package overnight, when you can track it on the Internet until it reaches its destination.

An effective anti-counterfeiting solution contains multiple, layered components

As a brand owner, it’s good to have options. However, the counterfeiter also has options. Fortunately, technology continues to evolve to help you protect your end users. Today’s reality is that one level of security isn’t enough.

Recently a number of technologies have become available that offer the benefit of not having to add any additional features to the packaging, but the imaging requirements on the production lines can be quite demanding and difficult to implement at speed. Once captured, the identification of the package can take place with conventional cameras, allowing widespread authentication and tracking by inspectors, retailers, or even consumers.

Any combination of covert or overt features or serialization enhance your anti-counterfeiting, anti-diversion strategies. Click here to learn more about brand protection. You can also contact Authentix at info@authentix.com.

Frost & Sullivan Awards Authentix with the Authentication Solutions Technology Leadership Award

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Author: Kathryn Olivier

By: Mohamed Lazzouni, COO, Authentix

Remember as kids the excitement you felt upon receiving a blue ribbon or trophy from sports or an art or science project? Your parents would post it on the refrigerator and tell everyone how proud they are of you. That’s how I felt upon learning that the prestigious Frost & Sullivan research firm presented Authentix with the North American Authentication Solutions Technology Leadership Award. In that excitement, I immediately recognized that the award itself takes on a different meaning.

For more than 20 years, Authentix has proudly supported a global customer base in combating illicit trade and counterfeit practices. Frost & Sullivan is diligent in their research to identify those companies exemplifying best practices in the development and delivery of technology. The technology leadership award recognizes the transition Authentix is leading toward incorporating more IoT and Big Data analytics within authentication technologies.

According to Frost & Sullivan, “The company’s solutions capitalize on the evolution of Mega Trends such as Internet of Things, Big Data analytics and supply chain integration to thwart counterfeiting measures. This integration enables the company to build and implement robust, end-to-end authentication solutions to help each customer recover lost revenues and protect brand equity.”

Full transparency, it is rewarding to know that the hard work of all Authentixians is front and center for others to witness. Just as relevant is the spotlight being shined on a greater cause – the charge against illicit trade.

The Core of Authentix Comes to Life

Like many organizations, we have our core values that drive how we engage internally and externally. I am most proud of this team because those values come to life with such recognition. This Frost & Sullivan technology award symbolizes validation of our strategy in the authentications market.

All employees seek to focus on the following core values:
Teaming and Collaboration
Advancing Science
Dedication to Client Success
Competing and Winning

This third party validation imparts depth to those value statements that demonstrate more than words on paper. We are laser focused on creating a path where our clients have visibility to their supply chain to efficiently address illicit activity. While the Authentication Solutions Technology Leadership Award speaks to how we are advancing science to create successful outcomes for our clients around the world, I know that this award also demonstrates a group of people who respect and trust each other enough to innovate for a greater good.

Recognition for a Greater Cause

To have Frost & Sullivan acknowledge that Authentix offers leading authentication technology touching across multiple industries is one thing. To also have confirmation that our strategy and execution in the marketplace is meaningful toward a social good is even better.
Oftentimes, this activity is funding organized crime or terrorist groups. In the oil and gas market, we are helping companies fight against fuel smuggling, adulteration or dilution, which can impact the environment and ultimately people’s health. So, this award also confirms that our focus on innovation is contributing to a larger platform that encompasses protection for the health and well-being of the environment and all who inhabit it.

Thank you to Employees and Customers

Yes, our employees carry the brunt of this accomplishment. But, we can’t ignore the greatest collaboration effort with existing customers. Illicit trade is a huge and sometimes dangerous global problem eating away at billions of dollars of lost revenue for many governments and companies. We are very grateful to have a customer voice moving our technology forward because they too recognize a bigger issue.

Every day we enter our doors with the intent to make a difference. We want to make a difference for our customers. We want to make a difference in the lives of our fellow employees. More importantly, we want our solutions to make a difference within the communities around the world.

The North American Authentication Solutions Technology Leadership Award from Frost & Sullivan is one more proof point that our suite of authentication solutions protecting fuel quality for national governments or oil marketing companies, banknotes and commercial brand products is making a difference to stop illicit trade.

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