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Not everything needs to be printed.
Its really low tech to make your own mimeograph machine.
https://www.mimeographrevival.com/posts/the-tin-can-wonder-a-low-tech-diy-mimeograph-machine/
It’s even lower tech to make a Hectograph, basically a mimeograph made in a cookie sheet. It uses common materials like unflavored gelatin and boric acid.
The paint can mimeograph is really cool but it looks like the special waxed stencil paper is basically out of production (aside from a Japanese artist who makes it and is willing to sell it internationally). Do you know of another source? It sounds like it can be made diy but that is an extra step in making the flyers.
(I was thinking about how one might combine that old tech with a modern laser etching machine for some especially fancy stencil work.)
The second link for the even simpler hectograph gives some suggestions. Are you USA based?
If so, I found this supplier using the search term “mimeograph masters “.
https://www.officedepot.com/a/products/852830/SKILCRAFT-Mimeograph-Paper-Letter-Size-Paper/
That’s for 10 reams and it’s discontinued but it was the first clue for a US domestic supplier that isn’t exorbitant etsy prices, which seems a bit much, but I will keep digging to see if I can find a better source.
This link from the same site has a long discussion of the paper needed for the masters.
https://www.mimeographrevival.com/posts/stencil-paper/
It looks like paper that just has certain properties to hold onto the ink well enough without bleeding so it can then be used to make multiple impressions.
The hectograph method my mom used back in the day involved hand writing on the master sheet as it lay upon the prepared ink bed, then using the inked back side of the master to make enough copies of a worksheet for her classroom. So some experiments may be in order.
Printed documents have embedded yellow dots which allow tracing back to the printer which printed it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Printer_tracking_dots
Just keep that in mind.
But your printer at a thrift shop and use it on an air-gapped PC, problem solved no?
At a thrift shop with cash
Ftfy
Is there a good way to check if running a color printer without a color cartridge will drop that stenography or switch to another kind like dithering?
I think a lot of the time, the printer will straight up refuse to print if it's out of color ink, even if there's plenty of black ink. I imagine that's to avoid getting around it.
Clearly not all printers are capable of this.
The EFF has stated that basically every color printer does this now, so much so that they stopped updating the list of the ones that do. You need to be aware of it.
The EFF stated in 2015 that the documents that they previously received through a Freedom of Information Act request[7] suggested that all major manufacturers of color laser printers entered a secret agreement with governments to ensure that the output of those printers is forensically traceable.
Every printer is capable of this stenography, and every printer does so at the behest of the US and other governments. This has been happening since at LEAST 2004.
Again, not all printers print in color.
Black and white printers employ stenography too.
https://openreview.net/pdf?id=F-IFNTqwEv
Stop being so confidently incorrect for fucks sake.
Black and white printers employ stenography via dithering the image.
So unless you're using some ancient dot matrix printer via an old LPT port, chances are anything you print can be traced back to you.
I'm saying this for your SAFETY you luddite. I have a past in the security industry and you wouldn't believe the things that they can use to identify you.
I get it, ignorance is bliss and all, but I'm trying to educate you. Activism is going to be a little uncomfortable.
The article you linked to does not say that all, or even any, grayscale printers automatically insert any kind of steganography into their output. Nor could I find anything like a reliable source claiming that they do. It's been known for a very long time that the kind of technique they were proposing as a possibility could be done, but there seems to be no evidence that what you're claiming is actually happening.
There's no need to shout at people and call them names (incidentally, how does being insufficiently skeptical of digital printers make someone a "luddite"?) for having a somewhat higher level of risk tolerance than you. The risk you're describing may or may not actually even exist. If it exists, it may or may not apply to them. How old is their printer? Did they buy it new from the manufacturer, with cash from their small town electronics shop, or used at a garage sale from someone who never knew their name? Even if the printer is somehow traceable to them, the technique you're worried about is apparently not public knowledge, so would law enforcement be willing to expose it publicly in court to prosecute you over a flyer for your local mutual aid project, or whatever people have in mind to print a flyer for? Would they even bother with forensic analysis and significant investigative footwork on some random flyer they found posted around town (as opposed to large-scale counterfeiting or copying of classified documents, which are apparently the only cases this technology is known to have been used in)? Would it be reliable with documents that have been taped over and exposed to the elements, as flyers often are? Other methods of publicizing things are also susceptible to other types of forensic analysis and surveillance. Are those risks necessarily lower? How do you know?
Many people with professional backgrounds like yours overestimate the risk from highly sophisticated but rarely used law enforcement techniques while overlooking much less exotic ones that are actually bigger risks to most ordinary people. Activism, if it's genuinely subversive, is usually more than a little uncomfortable and inherently involves risks, which are never 100% avoidable. Insisting on absolutely airtight "opsec" for everything one does that the government might find objectionable is paralysing to the point that it can amount to "obeying in advance" and arguably increases risk for everyone by reducing the pool of dissidents the state needs to contend with and creating a pervasive atmosphere of silent obedience. People should be aware of what plausible risks they face, but ultimately have to make their own decisions about what level of risks they're comfortable with. You don't need to get angry and personally attack people for not overstating them.
Crazy and concerning. Thanks for sharing.
Do you know if plotters have anything like this, or would I be safe using mine?
It'd be quicker and probably easier to 3d print a set of custom stamps, and use that.
Alternatively, a stencil and spray paint will never leave you with these problems. You'll just have to severely limit the size of your "flier". That, and being careful about how you buy your spray paint.
Yeah, but I've got a plotter and not a 3D printer lol
You could still use your plotter to make a stencil. Get a sheet of cardboard/plastic/thin wood, have it plot your design, and then manually cut out the lettering/symbols/etc.
Been planning to do basically that with mine for a while now.
I've made stencils before, but I was wanting a decent pasteup option too, just because they're faster to put up and less sus than spray paint. Maybe leave a tiled flier design to run overnight and then cut it apart or something.