It follows that both the client and the real mafioso have an interest in promoting unambiguous identification. The false mafioso, by contrast, has an interest in blurring the distinction. While the genuine article tries to generate signals which cannot be pirated, the fake tries to imitate those signals. In this market protectors have to fight hard to prove their authenticity, and the problems of identification and counterfeiting reach obsessive proportions.

Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Busi…, loc. 116