DDR Sc#227B Printing Error

I would like to show you this copy of the DDR issue Five Year Plan that I have classified as SC#227b. As can be seen, the stamp has a printing error that has left numerous white dots throughout the design, like a snowfall. The effect is especially curious in the B of REPUBLIK (Where you can also see the outline of the letters otherwise invisible in a common stamp, I think...). I hope you find it interesting.

Looks like it is under inked - not an error. Just poor quality control


Peter

Looks like silverfish damage to me. Those white spots look like they are missing paper as well as ink.

Simple answer ----- Those C-T-O stamps were sold with full gum . If you stack the stamps one on the other ,then put them in a dealer card or a glassine for a few years {they were laying somewhere for 50 years } . Then you seperate them . That is what happens the gum will pull off the ink on the underlying stamp.

I can't agree with the last 2 answers... lack of paper? You think that if it were torn paper I wouldn't have noticed it with the microscope, I have too many broken and bad stamps to know how to distinguish that, even if I'm a novice. Accumulated stamps that stuck to each other? It could be more likely, but if so the CTO cancellation would also be damaged. Neither of the two conclusions fits what has happened to this stamp, I refer again to the visible outline of the letters REPUBLIK (especially the B), neither the paper tears nor the torn ink create that perfect effect.