News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on printed document. Parent comment

Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by phkahler on Friday May 13, 2022 @09:49AM (#31367568)
This could all be deflection. All name-brand printers (in the US at least and probably everywhere) watermark printed pages with yellow dots that identify the printer serial number. If the printer is purchased with a credit card and the SN is scanned, there is a perfect trail from your printed page to the person who bought it. I suspect if that method was used they still may want to claim these other fingerprinting methods to avoid spreading the word about printers.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by reset-password on Friday May 13, 2022 @12:39PM (#31369765)
One other way this trail can be made is simply by installing the drivers. For example I noticed that when you complete the driver installation for a Brother color laser printer, the installer opens the default browser and navigates to brother.com/something/SERIAL_NO_OF_PRINTER. I am assuming that on the other end they're capturing the IP, fingerprinting the browser, and logging it all forever.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by joering2 on Friday May 13, 2022 @05:27PM (#31372711)
Brother is same level evil as Canon. I was proud to learn even my new Xerox Phaser 8550 is not fingerprinting paper.

https://www.eff.org/pages/list-printers-which-do-or-do-not-d...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by abakker on Friday May 13, 2022 @10:03AM (#31367754)
Got a source for this claim?

Edit: Specifically, what about printers that only print black and white?

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by k1t on Friday May 13, 2022 @10:14AM (#31367910)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_Identification_Code

https://www.eff.org/press/archives/2005/10/16

The implication is that only color printers are affected.

"The U.S. Secret Service admitted that the tracking information is part of a deal struck with selected color laser printer manufacturers, ostensibly to identify counterfeiters."

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by macksd on Friday May 13, 2022 @10:35AM (#31368205)
People are really using consumer printers in counterfeiting?
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by bragr on Friday May 13, 2022 @10:58AM (#31368523)
No because most will refuse to print anything with the EURion constellation.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/EURion_constellation

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by badwolf on Friday May 13, 2022 @01:41PM (#31370472)
Huh. Fascinating.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by joering2 on Friday May 13, 2022 @05:29PM (#31372722)
Same with photoshop. Try to open this in PS:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/Obverse_...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by bombcar on Friday May 13, 2022 @01:37PM (#31370435)
People will try anything, and I suspect more "counterfeiting" is prevented by the EURion constellation than we'd expect.

Probably just idiots playing around with the copier rather than dedicated gangs, but if it worked they might be tempted to say "Well ..."

https://old.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/1s8rl9/i...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by Ferrotin on Friday May 13, 2022 @02:32PM (#31371029)
This at least massively reduces anti-counterfeiters’ caseload.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by bombcar on Friday May 13, 2022 @07:10PM (#31373496)
IIRC some of the very early dollar bill acceptors on vending machines were perfectly happy with a black and white photocopy.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by loopback_device on Friday May 13, 2022 @10:21AM (#31367998)
It is quite well known these days, check the EFF [1] and Wikipedia [2] pages, there's info on the what, how, when and why

[1] https://www.eff.org/pages/list-printers-which-do-or-do-not-d... [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_Identification_Code

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by shirleyquirk on Friday May 13, 2022 @10:14AM (#31367914)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_Identification_Code but idk about how many printers do this or whether similar techniques are used for black+white printers (i.e. gray-scale modulation)
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Police claims to have fingerprinted computer based on pri... by not2b on Friday May 13, 2022 @06:22PM (#31373147)
Color printers must do this; black-and-white printers do not (and cannot, there's no yellow ink).
[ Parent | on HN ]