With the stakes rising, how worried should we be about high quality counterfeit cards
 

We've all been watching and marveling at the exponential increase in card prices (modern and vintage) recently.

I know most people on this board and vintage collectors in general are honest folks. However, money tends to attract lots of different types of people...including scam artists and crooks.

We've always believed it is hard to counterfeit old, vintage cards. And I believe that to a degree. I think it would be hard if not impossible for most people to produce a believable counterfeit with easily accessible equipment.

However, over the last 12 months there are MANY cards that have crossed over the 50K range. Making it reasonable for a bad actor to invest a lot of money in to specialized equipment to produce fake cards in small batches and still be able to make a reasonable return.

And I have to be honest...the thread on this board a few months back regarding the Dover Reprint Cracker Jack card getting in to a PSA slab really spooked me. I mean, that card literally had the perforations showing and was still graded as an authentic card. That was a TERRIBLE fake. So my faith in PSA to be able to discern between an original and a professionally done counterfeit is low.

Unfortunately, I'm NOT in the group of people that has enough disposable income to be spending 50K on a card any time soon, but for those people that will be...is that something that should cross their mind? Do you think PSA and SGC are being extra diligent to be on the lookout for a fresh breed of crooks to enter the market along with all these high dollar buyers?

Great question - you have to figure that with stakes getting this high the TPGs better be on their toes. The next question - can we trust the TPGs? Pretty soon it will just be too expensive to have a high dollar card graded.

I thought the TPGs fees are based on the value of the card. Is that not correct? If so, how much is it going to cost to have a TPG encapsulate the following:

• T206 Green Cobb (VG-EX)
• 1933 Goudey Babe Ruth (any of them) (EX)
• Rookie Trout Chrome that recently sold for just stupid money

From my 30 plus years in graphic design, advertising and printing the technology and ability is there to create a perfect counterfeit vintage card. Vintage stocks can also be found. It's an expensive and time consuming project to faithfully recreate it but someone might try now that the stakes are getting higher. Cost has generally been the prohibitive factor in the past to make it worthwhile in my opinion.
I agree it's getting pretty scary with all the doctoring out there and fakes getting by grading companies. Makes me feel better that most of my nice vintage cards came from family collections or friends and were collected mostly before 1980. I'm extremely careful when buying vintage now especially since I collect raw cards.

Yeah, this was the answer I was afraid of...and it sounds like you have some expertise in the printing process.

With the payoff apparently being exponentially larger recently, it may make it worth while for criminals to invest the time/money.

And if someone perfects an undetectable counterfeit method...then what?

You're not alone. I recently returned to the hobby after a 9 year hiatus, and was dismayed (and also very impressed) to read about all of the work done over at Blowout in pulling back the curtain on the bad actor(s) in the PWCC situation. But it didn't really shock me, I've stuck with non-high grade vintage for a long time, partly because I never really trusted that the TPGs (or perhaps anyone) could detect expertly done trimming and/or doctoring.

But seeing that Connie Mack CJ reprint in a PSA slab really rocked me to my core. After I saw it, I just couldn't unsee it, if you know what I mean. It shattered my confidence in PSA.

One of the reasons I like my cards a little dirty.
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Yes, I enjoy cards in that condition as well. In my opinion, the "natural state" of a pre war card is a 2 or 3 grade. Postwar 1950's cards it is probably a 4 or 5.

In my head cards that are better than that either were originally opened by a kid overly obsessed with keeping his "toys" nice, or I suspect something fishy might have occurred.

I agree that the technology exists to make a counterfeit that could not be visually detected. Whether it can be made to also elude all measures of forensic detection is another question, as to accomplish that more is needed than just old paper stock. But given the financial incentive to do so, I wouldn't bet against it. The bottom line to me is that if an unknown copy of a highly desirable card (e.g., Baltimore News Ruth) was to suddenly turn up, without provenance to establish its existence to a period when the financial incentive to manufacture a counterfeit did not exist, I would not have the comfort level to consider acquiring it. And by provenance I am talking about more than just the story of the current owner attesting that it has been in the family for many years.

I will add that the existence of provenance IMO will begin to matter more and more in regard to condition rarity cards (e.g., 52 Topps Mantle). In that instance, the issue, besides whether the card is counterfeit, also is whether the card has been worked on. How many 1952 Topps Mantles 8 and higher do you think have not had work done on them? With that card, I think in time those that can be documented to come from the Rosen find will begin to sell for significant premiums. Being uncirculated cards not only are they much more likely to be unaltered, but also they posses a sheen and border whiteness that IMO give them noticeably greater eye appeal than non Rosen-find copies.

I’m more worried about usps “losing” packages, even registered mail ones.

Years ago, I bought a Davy Jones T206. It was in pristine condition. I had suspected I was ripped off and handled it so much, I think I dinged it. Looking back, no reason to fake a Davy Jones, but now...with the technology and stakes...I’m not so sure.

I agree, I've been saying that a nearly undetectable fake is possible since about 1981. The only thing that prevented credible fakes of modern cards in the 80's was that most of the fakers did sloppy work.

Today there's so much more access to materials that I believe it's even more likely.

Even the ink formulations can probably be duplicated. The machine to figure out the exact composition costs less than many cards now.

I recall a year or two ago there it was proven that a large percentage of vintage autographed cards that were authenticated/graded had fake autographs. I had always thought that some day I would splurge big bucks on an autographed T206. Of course one graded/authenticated so I know its real. I no longer plan on making that splurge.

What happens if we reach a point that fakes get so good that people lose confidence in the grading companies to detect. Will people spend $100,000 on a card that might be a reprint?

This one looks pretty darn good to me - none of the obvious telltale signs, and the print pattern looks like it *could* be legit if you were able to zoom in more closely/clearly.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1958-Topps-...EAAOSwGm1gNO8Y

Am I missing any dead giveaways about the card itself?

Only some that are only semi-obvious.

They're more obvious if you've handled a bunch of 58s, which is one of the reasons I usually recommend that anyone getting started buy a good sized lot of commons and spend some time with them before buying the expensive ones.
Even then, it helps to have the sort of brain that lets you see the details, and not everyone does. I can do it with cards, but usually not with autographs.

More cards for PSA!

I agree, a lot of counterfeit and altered cards are already graded and encapsulated never to be exposed to fresh air and further review again. And why would the owner subject their card to a review and loose a high grade or rare card. Even the talented folks on BO seem to determine alterations due to printing irregularities and not by detecting the actual adjustment.

The general hobby doesn’t seem to be concerned with the past scandals and the perpetrators seem to have dodged prosecution and continue to make hugh amounts of money. The only chance I see of anything changing is when an insurance company balks at paying a multimillion dollar claim and determines the cards in question were fake the whole time.

He was my favorite Monkey.

Extremely sad, but unfortunately very true.

Still holding out hope that the FBI is just being thorough and methodical in their investigation, rather than washing their hands of all this. The level of fraud and corruption is bigger than Mastro, Operation Bullpen, and the counterfeit signed T206 fiasco combined.

I've wondered and asked this very same thing. I'm surprised with the high dollars cards are selling for, someone hasn't taken the time to meticulously reproduce every detail in a fake so as to make it undetectable; instead it seems they make consistent visible mistakes when even an average graphic designer could edit an image/font to make it the exact measurements of the original. It would be a significant undertaking to exactly mimic the paper content, ink content, etc but it does seem doable? It almost seems an eventuality especially with technology and increasing market values.

Just curious, most are wondering about reprinting vintage cards. Wouldn't it be easier to reprint Jordan rookies that are newer and with less worries about finding a card stock to match.

I don’t know if it would be easier, but it would likely get more scrutiny than a good fake Goudey Ruth printed on 1930’s cardboard if the stock was right.

I believe that alternations are the concern, not undetectable counterfeits. There are always methods to identity reprints, even of modern cards, and undetectable reprints of Pre-War cards I don't believe is possible. Of course, errors and misidentifications will be made, but I think companies such as SGC and PSA will always be reliable as far as authentication goes.

And of course that's not to say there won't be detectable counterfeits that will be bought and sold. Bad counterfeits are bought today and have been for decades. That's not a matter of technological innovations.

The one area where a troublesome forgery of a Pre-War card(s) or similar memorabilia will happen is a brand new creation of something that didn't exist before (a fantast card). There a forger can use the Pre-War printing technology. As we all know, overprints or something like that can also be an issue, because someone's just adding a stamp or whatever to an authentic card.

This is the first fake I ever bought, at the first show I went to in 1978. It was a whole $2....
besides the falsely aged stock, the tip off was that that back didn't come on that card. (Pointed out to me by the dealer I hung out at)

https://www.net54baseball.com/pictur...pictureid=2226https://www.net54baseball.com/pictur...pictureid=2227

I got a lot better at picking that stuff up, partly because they made themselves a few fantasy cards, which were always sort of obvious.

in 82 or 83 they showed me a 51 Mantle that was being sent around to dealers in hopes they'd buy it.
Without telling me anything, they just handed it to me one day and asked me what I thought. It was incredibly nice looking. Today it would probably be a 9 or 10.
"Beautiful card, but it's fake. And it bugs me that I can't explain why"
I tried finding an explanation for maybe a half hour.

Apparently that was their opinion, and that of at least 3-4 other dealers who had seen it.
It still sort of bugs me, and I'm almost positive that today I could explain why.
I also wonder where that card is now, and if it's in a very highly graded slab.

It would depend on the set. In some ways, a modern card is harder. Separating the four colors on the picture and getting the exact halftone would be difficult.

Any of the single color sets would be fairly easy if someone was skilled. Same for the two color sets like E100 or T210

Strip cards...Like W516 Which are often wildly inconsistent would probably be the easiest.
48Leaf
R302

"Good enough" to pass current grading wouldn't be hard.

"Good enough" to be totally undetectable? would be hard.

As others have said, a totally "new" fantasy set... easy.

I'll guarantee you I can build artwork that will look exactly like the original. Down to the dot pattern, dot size and off registrations. All one needs from that is vintage card stock that can easily be found and on offset printer still using the old pre press techniques. A few paper companies are also making some vintage style stocks these days due to the demand for more and more vintage looking materials. As for pre-war cards those unique printing processes are also still practiced by smaller companies and individuals albeit not a ton of them. Like I said earlier cost has always been the biggest factor but with prices getting crazy someone might be dumb enough to try it. If money can be counterfeited cards can be. Look at the lengths the government has had to go to prevent that. :)

It depends on which cards. Allen & Ginters and T206s, for example, simply cannot be exactly duplicated. For some modern card, it may be different.

Here is a link that gives some insight on counterfeiting. https://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=289753

The numbered cards of today aren't such a bad thing for modern. It would be strange to see multiple # 2/5 of the same Jordan on ebay.

There is a 1/1 where two copies are known.

Fleer kept a file copy that got into the hobby when Fleers files were sold.

I believe both are slabbed, and yes, the confusion was "interesting"

One's probably the equivalent of a proof or prototype.

IMO the bigger threat is someone knocking off the PSA holders and then encapsulating genuine cards, especially modern where the PSA grade blessing means thousands of dollars over minute or imperceptible differences. You can buy a beautiful raw 1996 Fleer Metal Kobe RC for $50-$100. A PSA 10 is a $3,000 card. A raw Ultra LeBron RC is also a $50-$100 raw card; PSA 10 $8,000. I would expect that the counterfeiters, who are likely going to be from China with access to the factories that make the card holders and components are located, will make what they know first. Run a third shift at the plastics factory making PSA holders, spend the $$ duplicating the flip in a high end print shop, get some raw cards and mint money. There are over 4,000 Kobe RCs in the PSA database, including over 900 nines; just take your pick of cert #s and go to work.

People that can spend 50k on a card (not me) have to consider fakes and be aware. If they don't they will eventually be out of some money, just as soon as the music stops.

Reminds me of the time, several years back, I bought a PRO graded Ruth ...To that point I had only seen really bad grading in their holders. After that I unfortunately found out they also graded fakes as originals. Regarding TPGs, I am happy another one is ramping up. If I am correct, they are the only one of the regular TPGs (and I think they will be regular) that offer a guaranty on their graded cards, and not just for the incorrectly done grading fees. :eek:

http://luckeycards.com/pf52frojoyruth.jpg



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Provenance, provenance, provenance.

It doesn't matter if a card is counterfeited in 2021 if you have proof your card existed in 2018

This.

Given the large percentage of investors who seem more interested in the holder than the card, this is where I would spend my time if I were a scum bag counterfeiter**

I would think the holders would be easier to counterfeit than a 100 year old card

** I am not

Wouldn't the problem to doing that be that unless you counterfeited a legitimate certification number on the flip, one could easily determine that the card is a counterfeit? And if you did use a legitimate certification number, you run the real risk of the owner of the legitimate flip coming forward and calling you out for fraud.

Yeah, which is why you do it with abundant modern cards like the Kobe RC I used as an example. How many of those could you pump out before it caused a problem? There are under 300 Kobe Bryant PSA Registry sets. That leaves over 600 PSA 9 cert #s to steal. A crook with a modicum of organizational skills could clear a small fortune before anyone took steps to stop it.

On the Cobb if you had it 10 yrs ago should have graded it then, probably$10,000 card then, now probably high $ 20,000 , not sure how they charge, had mine graded 20 years ago. Joe

Hi Leon,

As for the Fro-Joy Ruth, isn't it still technically possible that the one you pictured is real? I know that SGC (and PSA I believe) stopped grading that issue. Presumably because they couldn't discern between the real ones and the numerous fake ones?

I looked in to purchasing one of those a few years back but gave up...because if SGC and PSA admitted they can't tell the difference, then I wouldn't have a chance. It's not like I could just buy a few authentic commons to analyze the look, feel, smell, etc. (which is my usual practice before I buy something expensive)...because every card in the set is a Ruth :)

It is 100% real. SGC is incompetent to be able to grade them.

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If old masters paintings can fool experts in the art world so can anything else. Create a good fake get it passed a TPG and you probably have a large segment that just relie on the TPG, equals money in hand