Disclosed herein is an electrostatic ink composition comprising a component selected from a fatty acid ester having a plurality of hydroxyl substituents and a fatty acid amide having a plurality of hydroxyl substituents. Also described herein are scratch-off structures and methods for producing them.

A method is provided of digitally imaging a secure portion and a non-secure portion of scratch-off-coating protected documents of at least one game using middleware. The method includes: (a) generating the secure variable indicia in non-vector raster format; (b) generating vector graphics to be imaged on physical document locations; (c) assigning the secure variable indicia in a non-vector raster format to documents in and shuffling the documents throughout a print run; and (d) linking via middleware the secure variable indicia in the non-vector raster format to associated vector graphics variable indicia to be digitally imaged on the documents and to generate vector graphics-formatted data for each document in the print run. The secure variable indicia assignment and shuffling are executed by non-vector raster game generation software output that is reinterpreted by the middleware to produce related vector graphic output for the secure variable indicia.

A security-enhanced document includes a substrate and variable indicia comprising ink having a signal. The variable indicia is of a specific type and is applied to the substrate using a specific application technique. At least one other printed portion, which is a back of the document, has background ink noise, and the type of ink of the back of the document is of the same type of ink applied to the substrate using the same application technique as the ink of the variable indicia. The document also includes a scratch-off-coating applied over the variable indicia. The document has a signal-to-noise ratio of the ink of the variable indicia relative to the background ink noise of the back of the document that is not appreciable, thereby making the variable indicia unreadable with reference to the back of the document when the scratch-off-coating remains intact.

A method of encrypting at least a portion of PostScript vector language, where the PostScript vector language includes a cleartext portion and a ciphertext portion, the method including: (a) encrypting at least a part of the PostScript cleartext portion via an encryption algorithm with a generated encryption key resulting in at least a part of the ciphertext portion and overwriting the PostScript cleartext portion with the resulting at least part of the ciphertext portion; (b) saving the encryption key in a file separate from a file containing the PostScript vector language; (c) linking both the encryption key file and the PostScript file in an image processor interpreting the PostScript vector language to display or print PostScript graphics; (d) decrypting the at least part of the ciphertext portion resulting in decrypted PostScript cleartext; and (e) executing the resulting decrypted Postscript cleartext to produce an image on a document or screen.

A method of playing a lottery instant scratch ticket and game that provides a rectangular game grid in a first directional mode that is readable from left to right. Three additional possible directional modes are concealed by an opaque removable film. If the game grid provides a win according to the first directional mode and a predetermined paytable, a prize is awarded. The said three additional possible directional modes are then revealed, revealing one, two or three directional modes. The ticket is rotated 90°, 180° or 270° so that any revealed directional mode becomes readable from left to right. If the now-rotated game grid provides a win according to any additional directional mode and the predetermined paytable, a prize is awarded.

In one example of the disclosure, a substantially transparent substrate is provided at a printer. A primer layer is applied upon a first surface of the substrate. A security ink layer that includes security information is applied upon the primer layer. An opaque background ink layer is applied upon the security ink layer. A corona treatment is applied to a second surface, located on an opposite side of the substrate relative to the first surface. A release ink layer is applied upon the corona-treated second surface. An opaque cover image ink layer is applied upon the release ink layer.

A lottery ticket card includes a common game header section and a plurality of individual game tickets connected to and separable from the game header section. Each game ticket includes a separate and independently playable scratch-off lottery ticket and the common game header section comprises game identification information and instructions for play of the individual game tickets. A card code printed on the lottery ticket card uniquely identifies the lottery ticket card in a database, and a game ticket code printed on each individual game ticket uniquely identifies each of the individual game tickets in the database. Redemption of winning individual game tickets separated from the common header section is accomplished by entry of the game ticket code for the winning individual game ticket in the database.

The disclosure relates to devices, systems, methods and computer readable media for providing network management of remote card handling, and physical manipulation. More particularly, the disclosure is directed to networked devices, systems, methods and computer program methods for remotely, physically modifying a card while leaving a physical record of the modified card for inspection and validation and delivering the manipulation results to a user, and/or other third parties, for example, scratch lottery cards and ballot cards.

A method is provided of digitally imaging a secure portion and a non-secure portion of scratch-off-coating protected documents of at least one game using middleware. The method includes: (a) generating the secure variable indicia in non-vector raster format; (b) generating vector graphics to be imaged on physical document locations; (c) assigning the secure variable indicia in a non-vector raster format to documents in and shuffling the documents throughout a print run; and (d) linking via middleware the secure variable indicia in the non-vector raster format to associated vector graphics variable indicia to be digitally imaged on the documents and to generate vector graphics-formatted data for each document in the print run. The secure variable indicia assignment and shuffling are executed by non-vector raster game generation software output that is reinterpreted by the middleware to produce related vector graphic output for the secure variable indicia.

A set of printed lottery cards using a symbol pool of from 6 to 16 symbols, in this example 9 symbols to be randomly drawn at the end of the lottery. Each card has two matrices of 33 cells each displaying a set of 9 differing symbols on each card, and has an area for recording the sequence of the numbers drawn, and an area for recording the total number of links achieved across the two matrices. This example shows the resulting links on each matrix after all numbers have been drawn. By printing two or more matrices per card, the total of number of links per card is additive but the number of possible permutations increases dramatically. These cards can be printed on demand at State Lottery retail outlets or pre-printed and used as scratch and win cards.