When good brands fall victim to counterfeit fonts.
A high-profile automaker recently reported strange rendering behavior in their automotive displays, which were using Monotype’s Helvetica Now font. The automaker shared access to their platform and font integration tools with us, concerned that the rendering issues were due to bad outlines in Helvetica Now.
We weren’t able to reproduce the problem or uncover any outline-related problems in our font software no matter what we tried, with all our testing tools. That led us to one conclusion: The Helvetica Now font software that was implemented must not have been genuine and was not supplied by Monotype. We discovered that the car manufacturer had unwittingly found and downloaded a counterfeit version of this font on the internet. In the process of converting Helvetica Now, the counterfeiters created many software issues including the outline errors that this car manufacturer experienced.
This high-profile brand is known for using cutting-edge technology to create excellent driving experiences. And yet, a single mistake - using counterfeit fonts downloaded from the web, rather than supplied from official sources - put that user experience in jeopardy across their entire fleet of vehicles. Luckily, we were able to identify the problem and replace the counterfeit font with the genuine article, guaranteeing excellent rendering, global language support, and perfectly scaled type for every one of this car manufacturer’s innovative displays.
The most important benefit of the Monotype Fonts platform is peace of mind. Everyone who works with fonts—from the procurement teams that source them to the engineers and UX designers who use them—can rest assured that Monotype Fonts provides genuine fonts and software that won’t have any nasty surprises because they have been thoroughly tested. The alternative—downloading fonts from unknown online sources—has no such guarantees.
Need help ensuring you don’t fall into the same trap with your next font installation? See how we can help automotive brands deliver a superior (and reliable) in-car experience.
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