Fluorescent security elements verifying the authenticity of cigarette

The profit margin of smuggled cigarette is high as the rate of tax imposed is quite high in comparison with the cost of sales. The cigarette smuggling has occupied a position as the world largest smuggling merchandise beyond and over the peddler business, which appears as the biggest profit making business for those organized gangsters, military rebels & warlords or terrorists. In the past, the smugglers dodged the tax smuggled the genuine cigarettes, but now they manufacture the fake cigarettes and illegally sell. As the smugglers are using the elaborate forging even including the holograms, the major cigarette manufacturers have been struggling to win the wars against these fake cigarette products by frequently changing the packaging.


The fake cigarettes have been produced primarily in the Kaliningrad, and outskirt region of Russia, and East Europe countries, while the largest producing area is known as the China. The fake cigarettes produced in the Guandong Province and like places are disguised as other products and exported to whole world. Comparing the cigarette smuggling with that of narcotics,  the penalties are relatively trifling, and that is the reason why the fake cigarette smuggling are not subsiding.

In 2013, the 360 thousand packets(Appx. 2.2 million Euros) of fake cigarettes hidden inside one of Chinese cargoes at the Valencia Port, Spain were uncovered and disposed. In Korea as well, at one point the selling of fake premium products and 50 thousand packets of fake cigarettes made in China primarily around the entertainment business places were once exposed.

The labels attached for a purpose of preventing forging and falsifying are shown on the photographs taken for the Dunhill cigarette products. Flashing the UV ray using the UV LED Detector MP12t of M-VISION shows the letters of '中国烟草(Chinese cigarette)' standing for the China National Tobacco Corporation in a silver square at the bottom part of label, applying the fluorescent security element to verifying the authenticity of cigarette.

[Pictures of cigarette 'Dunhill']

[The authentic label]

[The authentic label under UV ray]

[Comparison of natural light with UV ray]

The genuine cigarettes are different from the fake cigarettes in terms of packet color, printing condition, content & etc. as well as the colors and flavors of cigarettes. The fake cigarettes hold more trunks than cigarette leaves, containing several more times of tar and nicotine contents, and the heavy metals such as cadmium, insecticides, rat poisons and even the human feces. Further, the functions of fake cigarette filters are so poor inflicting lots of damage to human bodies. It is necessary to pay extra attention not to hurt our health because of fake cigarettes.