WASHINGTON (AP) — A new $20 bill is coming with high-tech features designed to trip up computer-savvy counterfeiters. But the change people will notice first is the larger and slightly off-center portrait of Andrew Jackson.
The new portrait, like the old, is based on a drawing from about 1820. But it’s a close-up and shows the nation’s seventh president with darker hair than the earlier version. The view on the back depicts the White House from the north rather than from the south.
Most of the changes are more than cosmetic. They’re aimed at bogus bill makers armed with increasingly sophisticated color copiers, computer scanners, color ink jet printers and publishing-grade software.

The features include:
— A watermark to the right of the portrait and in its shape, only smaller, visible when the bill is held up to light.
— An embedded polymer security thread to the far left of the portrait. “USA TWENTY” and a flag are printed on the thread. When exposed to ultraviolet light, the thread glows green.
— A numeral on the lower right corner of the front printed in color-shifting ink that looks green when viewed straight on and black when viewed from an angle.
— Very fine lines around Jackson’s portrait and the picture of the White House. When duplicated on a copier, the lines come out in a wavy moire pattern.
The new notes will begin circulating in the fall. Old $20s will be recirculated until they wear out, on average in about two years. Those notes will be legal tender indefinitely.
The government began redesigning U.S. folding money with the introduction of a $100 note with Benjamin Franklin in March 1996 and the $50 bill with Ulysses S. Grant last October.
Simultaneous issues of new $10 and $5 notes and a “more modestly redesigned” $1 note are planned.