666: The Mark of the Beast

666, UPC Bar Codes, & the Devil

Some people claim that UPC barcodes contain "666", the so-called Mark of the Beast. The devil isn't in UPC bar codes. Believe me, Satan couldn't care less about UPC barcodes.

I, on the other hand, do care about barcodes; all barcodes not just UPC version A. I've been involved with printing barcodes for almost 18 years and founded Azalea Software back in 1992. I authored The Bar Code FAQ years ago and pen a barcode blog. Let's just say I'm passionate about barcodes.

I'm also not the Devil's little helper. And neither are the many other people in my industry I've met over the years, especially the folks at GS1, the standards body. Heck, they should be ground zero for The Dark One's plot to enslave humanity if the urban myths were true.

Honestly? I'm a loving dad, responsible small business owner, and moral person. Raised in the church and now an aspiring Buddhist with strong Taoist roots. Nice guy. Hardly Satan's pawn. I don't even like Halloween. Day of the Dead yes, Halloween no. Yes, I cast a shadow.

So how did this urban myth get started? Nut jobs who don't know jackshit about barcodes. Fanatics with an agenda, truth be damned. It all begins with a misinterpretation of Revelation 13:16-18, and I quote:

16 And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:
17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.
  King James Version 2000

16 Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead,
17 so that no one buy or sell who does not have the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name.
18 This calls for wisdom: let anyone with understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a person. Its number is six hundred sixty-six.
  New Oxford Annotated Bible

Everyone focuses on the number 666. The logic goes that when the shit hits the fan (Book of Revelation) no one will be able to do commerce without the mark of the beast on one's right hand or forehead. Error one: barcodes are on boxes of corn flakes, bottles of shampoo, and six-packs of beer, not on people. I can buy any of these items with a twenty dollar bill, no UPC tattoo required. Not that barcode tattoos aren't popular.

"If 666 are the Devil's digits, how then does one "see" 666 in a UPC barcode? How is 666 hidden in Uniform Product Code symbols? Where is this rumored 666?"

All the fuss is about the left, middle, and right guard bars within a UPC barcode. The guard bars are visual reference points that aid scanners in deciding what type of barcode is being read. In and of themselves, they don't encode any information. There's really no "6" in them.

In fact, there are two different 6's in the UPC character set, one used on the left side of the symbol and another on the right. After using the guard bars to determine that it's a UPC barcode, the scanner can tell if it's moving left-to-right or right-to-left by the patterns for each digit. If the six on the left is different than the 6 on the right, the scanner knows which way it's moving and which digit is the check digit, the first one it read or the last one. To you and I the check digit is on the right but the scanner doesn't know which direction the barcode is oriented and which relative direction the scanner sweeped over. Makes me wonder if the other six was used would the Mark of the Beast conspiracy be true? No. There goes half the logic.

The graphic on the left shows the bar and space pattern, and overall character width for the right 6, the middle guard bars, and the left & right guard bars, top to bottom.The black and white areas represent the bars and spaces, and the red area is the next character. There are different numbers of elements (3, 5, and 7 characters respectively) that make up each character's pattern. They all have different widths. Even the two types of guard bars are different and neither matches the 6.

The pattern for the right side 6 is similar to the guard bars. The left and right guard bars have the pattern of 101 (thin bar, thin space, thin bar). The center guard bars have a wider pattern, 01010 (thin space, thin bar, thin space, thin bar, thin space). Meanwhile our six has a pattern of 1010000 (thin bar, thin space, thin bar, 4X wide space). I don't see a match between 101, 01010, and 1010000, do you?.

What have we learned? Is "666", the so-called Mark of the Beast to be found in UPC barcodes? Repeat after me: No!

There's plenty of 666 trivia. Read the Wikipedia entry on 666 too.