Fake Notes Are A Real Issue

The introduction of Australian decimal currency to the Islands in February proved, if nothing else, that just about every community can produce an up-to-the-minute confidence trickster.

On Nauru, it didn't take long for someone to hit on the idea of cutting colour pictures of the new notes out of an Australian magazine and attempting to pass them off as the genuine article.

Warned the Nauru Administration news-sheet, “Fake dollar bills have been detected in the last few weeks and all residents are warned to be on the lookout".

One of the notes consisted of two pictures stuck together. Another was of single thickness, with no picture on the reverse side.

The news-sheet went on to add: “The simplest method of detecting a fake note is to hold it up to the light. A real note not only has a watermark, but contains a thin metal thread across the narrow section of the note."

Similar instances have been occurring in Papua-New Guinea. “Play money”, and notes cut from advertisements, have also been passed.

These “notes" of course wouldn’t bear any real inspection, but apparently some of them have been good enough as one-shotters amons unsuspecting bush kanakas.