Hollow Spy Coins Are Perfect Metaphor of Current Economy

Check out the photos of the spy coins on the link below.

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FROM:
http://gizmodo.com/5066992/hollow-sp...urrent-economy

Hollow Spy Coins Are Perfect Metaphor of Current Economy

Back in the good old days of the Cold War, spies didn't
have encrypted cellphones or digital thingamajigs to do
their thing, so they did their spy business with classic
spy stuff like spy camera-pens, spy shoe transmitters,
spy bacon strips, and messages encoded on their spy
underpants. Or these Hollow Spy Coins, which were used
by the CIA and the KGB to hide poison or microfilms.
Now you can buy them to store whatever is small enough
to fit in them, like discarded nail bits. The coins are
still in use by modern spies, however: Last year, the
US Department of Defense cautioned its American
contractors about hollow Canadian coins containing
radio transmitters.

The Canadian coins were found by US defense contractors
working on secret projects on three occasions between
October 2005 and January 2006. Apparently, these were
used to track movements of people carrying them.
According to the experts, the coin transmitters could
have been planted by China, Russia, or even France,
not the Canadians, who actually said they didn't have
a clue these existed.

These ones are harmless, however, and come in a
variety of US and Soviet denominations, and you can
even buy a Hollow Steel Spy Bolt and a Dead Drop
Spike.

...

"Arizona Coin Collector" wrote in message
m...

Check out the photos of the spy coins on the link below.

Some 45 years ago I was given a similar hollowed-out coin but with no
lid piece. It was for a magic trick where you change a (hollowed)
penny into a dime. Still have it somewhere, maybe I'll drag it out
and do some magic for my grandchildren.

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FROM:
http://gizmodo.com/5066992/hollow-sp...urrent-economy

Hollow Spy Coins Are Perfect Metaphor of Current Economy

Back in the good old days of the Cold War, spies didn't

Arizona Coin Collector wrote:
Check out the photos of the spy coins on the link below.

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FROM:
http://gizmodo.com/5066992/hollow-sp...urrent-economy

Hollow Spy Coins Are Perfect Metaphor of Current Economy

The information in that link is wrong.

Here's a bit from:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/...n2766167.shtml

There's more there for anyone interested.

quote

An odd-looking Canadian coin with a bright red flower was the culprit behind
the U.S. Defense Department's false espionage warning earlier this year, The
Associated Press has learned.

The odd-looking — but harmless — "poppy coin" was so unfamiliar to
suspicious U.S. Army contractors traveling in Canada that they filed
confidential espionage accounts about them. The worried contractors
described the coins as "anomalous" and "filled with something man-made that
looked like nano-technology," according to once-classified U.S. government
reports and e-mails obtained by the AP.
An odd-looking Canadian coin with a bright red flower was the culprit behind
the U.S. Defense Department's false espionage warning earlier this year, The
Associated Press has learned.

The odd-looking — but harmless — "poppy coin" was so unfamiliar to
suspicious U.S. Army contractors traveling in Canada that they filed
confidential espionage accounts about them. The worried contractors
described the coins as "anomalous" and "filled with something man-made that
looked like nano-technology," according to once-classified U.S. government
reports and e-mails obtained by the AP.

/quote