New $100 bill has more Ben, more safeguards

His stringy hair still needs a wash, but it's a bigger, better, safer Benjamin Franklin on the refurbished $100 bill introduced today. The bill goes into circulation in February, tricked out with new security measures that might have pleased the tinkerer in Franklin, a Founding Father who invented the lightning rod.

A blue 3-D ribbon on the front casts images of bells and 100s that shift from one to the other when the bill is tilted. The "Bell in the Inkwell" changes from copper to green as you alter your perspective. See for yourself.

Of course all the high-tech snazziness is to counter the counterfeiters -- especially important considering that the $100 bill, last redesigned in 1996, is the largest denomination still produced by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. It remains the most counterfeited note outside of the United States, according to the Treasury.