BANGOR, Maine — When it comes to this "funny money," there are ways to protect yourself from becoming a victim.
Police and business owners say there are three key ways to weed out traditional counterfeit money: texture, color, and size. Some or all of those elements will likely be off with counterfeit cash.
One Bangor establishment that is always on the lookout for counterfeit money is the Hollywood Casino.
Casino managers say a counterfeit $100 bill was used there just a week and a half ago after being accepted in the poker room.
However, Player Services Manager Kristen Duncan says it's rare for counterfeit money to slip through the cracks because employees are trained to detect it.
"We train the employees what to look for. So obviously we're teaching them the difference between what it feels like, between a regular $100 and counterfeit. We're teaching them to look for blurry numbers, different serial numbers, the stripe when you hold it up to the light. We're teaching them the difference between the watermarks. So we're teaching everybody, plus we have deterrents in all the machines on the floor that will pick it up if it's not real," says Duncan.