Interesting link, thanks. I get the impression though that there's not going to be any alternative to buying directly, for the foreseeable future.

I clicked through to the article on Physically Unclonable Functions (PUFs). [0] Neat idea. (I found the paper more readable than the article. [1]) Limited scope though. I don't imagine it's possible to use this approach for non-electronic items like medical-grade screws, for instance.

[0] https://semiengineering.com/pufs-promise-better-security/

[1] (PDF) https://spqrlab1.github.io/papers/holcomb_PUFs_date14.pdf