Twenty years ago, the euro replaced national currencies such as the German mark, the lira and the franc as cash. In a series, the SZ explains why the euro was controversial among economists and which crises the common currency had to survive. You can find all articles on this overview page.
A couple of false notes started the investigation. The very good quality euro blossoms were seized in 2018 and assigned to the so-called Napoli class by the police and the Bundesbank. Three years later, in May 2021, investigators from the State Criminal Police Office (LKA) in Düsseldorf, together with Italian authorities, searched objects in Naples and in several cities in North Rhine-Westphalia. Among other things, they found false documents, real cocaine and 160,000 euros of very high quality counterfeit money. The officers arrested four Italians who live in Germany. Another lead leads to the Neapolitan mafia.
It has long been known that there are counterfeiters, especially in the Naples area, who perform true arts in their craft. “It is a European crime that must be combated in Europe,” says Oliver Huth. The chief detective leads the investigation complex (EK) Alleanza at the LKA NRW, his team smashed the counterfeit ring.
“One cannot be satisfied with arresting and prosecuting a perpetrator in Düsseldorf, we have to know where the counterfeit money was produced,” says Huth. So you have to contact the foreign law enforcement authorities as quickly as possible and coordinate them. “It takes a long time, and meanwhile the perpetrators change production locations and cover their tracks.”
In 2001 it was said: no need to worry
They are current problems in an old crime area. Counterfeiting has been around for as long as there has been money, the dark field is wide and the perpetrators have always been flexible. When the first euro notes were issued 20 years ago, traders and consumers worried that they would not become familiar with the new notes quickly enough to recognize flowers.
In December 2001, the then Federal Finance Minister Hans Eichel (SPD) said in an interview with the SZ that controls had been tightened and appealed to citizens to take a closer look. “By the way: The euro is much more forgery-proof than the D-Mark because a number of new technologies are now being used. So there is no need to worry,” said Eichel.
Statistics from the European Central Bank (ECB) contradict this. In 2002, there were 22 recognized counterfeits for every million real euro banknotes in circulation – apparently the counterfeiters had not yet got the hang of the new currency. In the following two years the numbers soared, in 2004 there were 62 forgeries for every million real notes.
A competition between banks and counterfeiters
“It’s a competition: we have to keep developing and introducing new features in order to be one step ahead of the counterfeiters,” says Johannes Beermann; he is responsible for cash on the Bundesbank executive board. “The longer a series remains on the market unchanged, the more likely it is that there will be an increased number of counterfeits.”
In order to be able to take countermeasures, one is in a constant exchange in the euro system, says Beermann: “After all, euro bills are printed all over Europe, so it has to be clarified how color and figural deviations may look like, for example.” Last was the Europa series introduced, between 2013 and 2017 the new 5, 10, 20 and 50 euro bills and on May 28, 2019 the hundreds and two hundred notes.
The example from Düsseldorf clearly shows how quickly the counterfeiters react. Just six months after the ECB issued the new 100 euro bills, the investigators found the first forgery in all of Europe.
The manufacturers are primarily concerned with selling the flowers. The buyers, in turn, are other criminals who use counterfeit money to save money. If someone pays just 10,000 euros in real money for a large cocaine purchase of 40,000 euros, it has already been worth it for them. And his salespeople have no interest in reporting the fraud to the police. Those who buy and sell goods from criminal offenses also like to use counterfeit money.
“This is a traditional business”
“For a single false 100-euro note you get 16 euros on sale, and that is expensive. So it depends on the quantity,” says Oliver Huth. In earlier accesses in Naples false fifties with a face value of 50 million euros were found. “If this is the daily work of a professional forger workshop, it becomes clear to what extent it is moving.” The customer base is enormous, referring to all areas of crime. “The groups of perpetrators are seismographically on the market, they waste neither time nor resources. This quality has to develop over the years, that is a traditional business.”
The Munich technology group Giesecke & Devrient is one of the few companies that produce banknotes, supply special paper and develop security features for the Bundesdruckerei and central banks. There, too, they are familiar with the race against counterfeiters – and are therefore not allowed to give any details.
Basically, banknotes can be secured three times, explains a company spokesman: through features that everyone can immediately recognize visually and haptically and easily check. With features that a test device, such as a UV lamp, can detect at the supermarket checkout. And on the third level of security through features that only central banks are familiar with. “Our experts work, for example, with tiny mirrors. They are aligned and shaped into the material in such a way that the sum of their reflections results in an image that appears to move dynamically as soon as you change the tilt angle of the banknote.” 3-D effects are also possible.
In 2020, the Bundesbank registered 58,800 false euro banknotes with a face value of 2.9 million euros in German payment transactions – 6.5 percent more than in the previous year. There, the counterfeits are noticed when they arrive in the branches, for example because someone brings them for assessment or dealers pay in their earnings. The Federal Criminal Police Office also reported for 2020 that the volume of counterfeit money rose by 70 percent.
In the end, it is the citizens who always lose. If you are caught paying with a wrong note, you will quickly have a complaint about placing counterfeit money on the market. The wrong notes are generally not replaced; this is annoying for private individuals as well as for tradespeople and even jeopardizes their very existence. And has not changed in 20 years.