Feb 3 2011
Applied DNA Sciences, Inc. (OTCBB: APDN), a provider of DNA-based anti-counterfeiting technology and product authentication solutions, announced that is has provided a unique DNA taggant to Prestigio en Moda for use in marking textiles to assist in the authentication of their products.
This taggant is specific to Prestigio en Moda and cannot be copied or otherwise used by any other entity.
Prestigio is a major uniform manufacturer in Mexico, calling on government agencies, including security groups and police departments. As the primary uniform manufacturer in Mexico, using the highest level of security, it is important for Prestigio and its clientele to have ability to verify genuine uniforms and to be able to determine authenticity of their products. For this reason, Prestigio was looking for an uncopyable, definitive technology to protect and authenticate their products -- SigNature® DNA taggants.
Counterfeit Uniforms used by Marauders
Stolen or counterfeit uniforms have long been the device of interlopers. In the infamous St. Valentine's Day massacre, Al Capone's henchmen were dressed as Chicago Police. Iraq has recently targeted tailors who make and sell counterfeit police and military uniforms, after attackers disguised as security forces carried out suicide bombings in Baghdad. Recently in the UK, a bogus policeman in fake uniform crashed a meeting of top cops attended by Britain's Home Secretary. In one of the boldest recent incidents, gangsters in a convoy of seven phony police vehicles kidnapped a mayor from his home near Monterrey in northern Mexico, last August. The mayor's body, blindfolded and hands bound, was found two days later, on a rural road. The alleged assassins were municipal police wearing federal police uniforms.
"Impersonating a law enforcement asset is ingenious and disturbing. It's the tactic of hiding in plain sight. Cops don't want to stop other cops," said Fred Burton, vice president at the security consultancy Stratfor and a counterterrorism adviser for the Texas Public Safety Department in a Washington Post article on Aug 30, 2010.
DNA Makes Uniforms Uncopyable
The threat of more clone attacks has grown so serious that the Mexican military has changed the design of its uniforms, trading camouflage for more counterfeit-proof patterns, according to Enrique Torres, a spokesman for military and police operations in the northern state of Chihuahua (Washington Post 8-30-2010).
Applied DNA Sciences has developed patents and amassed commercial experience related to the marking of fabrics with SigNature DNA and adducts of DNA markers with optical reporters. The company utilizes large, complex plant-derived and encrypted genomic (DNA) sequences to prepare SigNature DNA taggants. The utility of these markers as a security mark has been validated in studies funded by the Department of Energy at the US National Laboratories. Early deployment of SigNature DNA taggants has demonstrated that they are difficult or impossible to copy in scenarios when other security approaches have been rendered ineffective by organized counterfeiting criminals.
Source: http://www.adnas.com/