The Man Who Printed $7 Million With a $150 Printer and Hairspray

A $150 HP printer. A $9 can of hairspray. Seven million dollars in counterfeit cash. In 2004, a man with no printing experience walked into a Staples and bought the cheapest inkjet printer on the shelf. Four years later, the Secret Service had logged millions of his fake hundreds across Southern California — and they had no idea who he was. Albert Talton wasn't a master forger. He was an engineer who reverse-engineered the Treasury's security like it was a broken speaker. His method was so simple it sounds fake: two sheets of newsprint, a clothesline, and drugstore hairspray. How did he fool detection pens designed to catch every fake? How did he evade federal agents for three years? And what tiny mistake brought it all crashing down? This is the story of the most unlikely counterfeiter in American history.