TABLE 2.

Summary of included publications relating to the use of sensors in counterfeits or documentation analysis, alongside details of technologies currently used by UK police and authorities for on-site counterfeit and documentation analysis.

Sensing technology	Description	Research papers	Review papers
Colourimetric	Security inks using blue emitters have been demonstrated in anticounterfeiting labels	Kumar and Singh (2023)
Electrochemical	An ad hoc review looking at the potential for magnetic nanoparticles to enhance electrochemical detection for forensic applications is presented		Nadar et al. (2021)
Immunoassay	Two ad hoc reviews focus on the potential for aggregation-induced emission and magnetic nanoparticles to apply advances made in other sectors with this technology to forensic detection		Nadar et al. (2021), Yan et al. (2021)
Luminescence	Key themes were the use of doped materials and ecofriendly materials. Alongside ad hoc literature reviews	Fouad and Saif (2020), Guleria et al. (2020), Kamal and Saif (2020), Naik et al. (2020), Praveen et al. (2020), Srivastava et al. (2020), Suresh et al. (2020), Szczeszak et al. (2020), Abdollahi et al. (2022), Ansari et al. (2022), Han et al. (2022), Li et al. (2022a), Narasimhamurthy et al. (2021), Ravindra et al. (2021), Dwivedi et al. (2023)	Nadar et al. (2021), Yan et al. (2021), Tomar et al. (2023), Verhagen and Kelarakis (2020)
Raman	Broad overview in banknote security materials and analytical techniques that are used in detecting counterfeits		Tomar et al. (2023)
Other	Ad hoc review of LIBS and two papers detailing IR using chemometrics for printer ink analysis and banknote authentication	Paxton et al. (2021), Nurfarhana et al. (2022)	Senesi et al. (2021)
Currently used by UK police and authorities
UK police use various light sources, including ultraviolet (UV) and infrared (IR) light, for identifying security features (College of Policing, 2017). They also employ magnetic ink detectors and portable spectrometers for this purpose (Regula Forensics, 2025)