Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes ban: Security features in the new Rs 500 and Rs 2,000 notes

If you were one of the many who ran about in town last night either to top up your car’s fuel tank or to the nearest ATM, well today’s the calm after the storm. With that said, the banks will be stocking up on the new Rs 500 and Rs 2,000 banknotes. Coming to the point, there’s a lot of talk online about the notes being tagged using RFID technology. Well the new Rs 2,000 banknote issued by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) does come with plenty of new features, but from what they are telling us, the RFID tagging in all probability isn’t one of them. RFID tagging supposedly lets the government know where the banknotes are. This with the latest technologies can be pulled off by shooting out the right signals from radio satellites which are deflected by the tags to reveal their location. The notes themselves need no power source to be detected. One of the main problems with RFID tagged banknotes is that they are expensive to pull off. RFID tags cost between 20 cents to $1.00 as pointed out by  fleur-de-coin, which adds to the cost of making them, which is already a debatable topic. The last we heard of RFID technology, it was announced by Hitachi back in 2003, one that is said to be incorporated in the 500 Euro notes, one of the highest circulating banknotes in the world. Clearly, nobody knows whether the technology is present in the 500 Euro banknote (the European Central Bank makes no claim of this), but this would make a bit of sense, since the value of the note is a lot higher. Other than this there is the obvious “privacy” issues, meaning that most people would stay away from notes which can be traced. In fact I browsed around and even found a couple of wallets that supposedly come with RFID shielding to make them “untraceable”. As far the features of the new Rs 2,000 notes go, there is no mention of the same on the RBI’s official website. Now you could go with conspiracy theorists and believe that the government thinks its worth spying on every single Rs 2,000 out there or just ignore something that was never there and get on with your life and adopt the change. In the meanwhile, here are the other salient features of the new notes, that you should be aware about to keep track of counterfeiters: Rs 2,000 banknote features [caption id=“attachment_346077” align=“aligncenter” width=“380”]  The new Rs 2000 note[/caption] Obverse (Front): 1. See through register with denominational numeral 2000 2. Latent image with denominational numeral 2000 3. Denominational numeral २००० in Devnagari 4. Portrait of Mahatma Gandhi at the centre 5. Micro letters ‘RBI’ and ‘2000’ on the left side of the banknote 6. Windowed security thread with inscriptions ‘भारत’, RBI and 2000 on banknotes with colour shift. Colour of the thread changes from green to blue when the note is tilted 7. Guarantee Clause, Governor’s signature with Promise Clause and RBI emblem towards right 8. Denominational numeral with Rupee Symbol, ₹2000 in colour changing ink (green to blue) on bottom right 9. Ashoka Pillar emblem on the right Mahatma Gandhi portrait and electrotype (2000) watermarks 10. Number panel with numerals growing from small to big on the top left side and bottom right side For visually impaired Intaglio or raised printing of Mahatma Gandhi portrait, Ashoka Pillar emblem, bleed lines and identity mark 11. Horizontal rectangle with ₹2000 in raised print on the right 12. Seven angular bleed lines on left and right side in raised print Reverse (Back) 13. Year of printing of the note on the left 14. Swachh Bharat logo with slogan 15. Language panel towards the centre 16. Motif of Mangalayan 17. Denominational numeral २००० in Devnagari Rs 500 banknote features [caption id=“attachment_346076” align=“aligncenter” width=“385”]  The new Rs 500 note[/caption] Obverse (Front): 1. See through register in denominational numeral 2. Latent image of the denomination numeral 3. Denomination numeral in Devanagari 4. Orientation and relative position of Mahatma Gandhi portrait changed 5. Windowed security thread changes colour from green to blue when note is tilted 6. Guarantee clause, Governor’s signature with promise clause and RBI emblem tilted towards right 7. Portrait and electrotype watermarks 8. Number panel with numerals growing from small to big on the top left side and bottom right side 9.Denomination in numerals with rupee symbol in colour changing ink (green to blue) on bottom right 10. Ashoka pillar emblem on the right. For visually impaired: Raised printing of Mahatma Gandhi portrait, Ashoka pillar emblem, based and identification mark 11. Circle with Rs 500 in raise print on the right 12. Five bleed lines on left and right in raised print Reverse (Back) 13. Year of printing of the note on left 14. Swachh Bharat logo with slogan 15. Language panel towards centre 16. Red Fort- an image of Indian heritage site with Indian flag 17. Denomination numeral in Devanagari on right.