College and Professional Sporting Events Remain Popular Targets for Ticket Counterfeiters

Oct. 28, 2010 - PRLog -- PORTLAND, Ore. – For collegiate and professionals sports organizations and other live event organizers, counterfeit tickets continue to pose a significant challenge that costs organizers, venues, brand owners and customers millions of dollars each year. While counterfeiters will go to great lengths to make their fake tickets look authentic, BrandWatch Technologies recommends that ticket makers and sellers go even further by implementing multiple layers of covert and over security to guarantee their tickets’ authenticity. BrandWatch document security solutions can prevent tickets from unauthorized or illegal scanning, copying, and digital imaging, and can be delivered on paper, plastic or through the Internet.

“Few public events are immune to counterfeiters, and as we have seen early on during this year’s football season, it is difficult to go a week without reading news reports about sporting event fans and concert goers being scammed by counterfeit tickets,” said Phil Huff, president and CEO of BrandWatch Technologies. “Driven by consumers’ eagerness to find last minute, hard-to-find or discounted tickets, counterfeiters aggressively target amateur and professional sporting events, as well as concerts, Broadway shows and political rallies for their ticketing scams. In most cases, not only do the fans not get in the venues, they are out several hundred to several thousands of dollars per ticket. Fortunately, there are a variety of security technologies that can help prevent counterfeiting, authenticate tickets, and reduce risks for event organizers, venues and consumers.”

Among BrandWatch Technologies many covert and overt document security solutions include:
•   Specialty inks and optically variable inks that change color depending on the angle a ticket is being viewed;
•   Digital watermarking, which is embedded into the paper during the printing process;
•   Pantograph technology that embeds hidden words, logos or designs into the tickets;
•   Embedded graphic technology on documents that makes it impossible to reproduce protected documents on digital color copiers; and
•   Proprietary security taggants that can only be viewed with the aid of specialized detectors.

While it is the responsibility of the organizers and venues to protect the integrity of their tickets, consumers need to be aware of what ticket sites and services to avoid, as well as what to look for on the tickets to make sure what they are buying are in fact genuine tickets. Recent warnings from universities and professional sports franchises have advised fans against buying from scalpers and web sites such as Craigslist, while reminding them to look for security features such as holograms, bar codes and purposely placed perforation to ensure the tickets are authentic. Many organizations and teams have also launched their own online ticket resale sites to allow fans to buy, sell and exchange tickets with other fans, such as the NFL Ticket Exchange powered by Ticketmaster or the Philadelphia Flyers Ticket Marketplace.

“For today’s ticket producers, implementing multiple layers of security when producing their event tickets is critical,” added Huff. “BrandWatch works with event organizers and venues to create a layered security solution that will meet their specific ticketing needs, combining multiple elements that will result in tickets that are impossible to duplicate and allow for instant validation. Our solutions have been recognized for best technology in secure documents, and our ticket solutions help maintain confidence, integrity and trust, and have been successfully incorporated into a variety of sporting venue tickets, as well as national government conventions. ”

For more information about BrandWatch Technologies’ document security solutions, visit www.BrandWatchTech.com.

About BrandWatch Technologies
Established in 2001, BrandWatch Technologies is a global leader in brand security and product authentication solutions. Offering advanced overt and covert technologies for in-field verification, product fingerprinting, and forensic investigation, BrandWatch protects critical infrastructures such as agriculture, government, banking, defense, law enforcement, consumer products, transportation, and public health. The company focuses on securing supply chains, reducing liability, detecting counterfeits, implementing track and trace, identifying grey market diversion, and verifying product recycle chains. BrandWatch is a member of the North American Security Products Organization and the Document Security Alliance. Learn more at http://www.brandwatchtech.com.