SC Prison Officials Want to Jam Cellphones

By TChris, Section Inmates and Prisons
Posted on Tue Oct 21, 2008 at 11:13:59 PM EST
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Prisoners buy cellphones from guards or smuggle them into the prison during visits with friends and family. Some phones are discovered during shakedowns, but inmates find creative hiding places, particularly in larger, older prisons that don't have Supermax technology.

To counter a perceived security risk, South Carolina prison officials are exploring the possibility of jamming cellphone signals inside prison walls. Would you want to live within a mile of a large institution that jams cellphone transmissions?

Critics say it's impossible to contain the jamming technology to one or two buildings, and that using it runs the risk of affecting people using phones nearby.

[more ...]

"You can prevent emergency calls if these jammers are allowed," said Joe Farren, spokesman for CTIA-The Wireless Association, a trade group for the wireless industry. "You put signal jammers in, you interfere with critical communications, life and death."
That worry is shared by Zack Kendall, a security specialist for North Carolina's prison system, who said he doesn't know whether his prisons would take advantage of signal blocking because it could interfere with internal radio communications.

The company that wants to sell the jamming equipment to South Carolina assures prison officials that the jammers will be angled to confine their reach. Even if that's true, South Carolina faces an obstacle: a federal law prohibits interference with the airwaves.

The Federal Communications Commission can give federal agencies the authority to use such jammers. But there's no such provision for state and local law enforcement. ...
"We have no authority to even grant it if we thought it was worthwhile or something that was warranted," said Robert Kenny, a spokesman for the FCC. "It's likely going to take some level of action by Congress."

Will schools be next? Can't stop kids from texting in class without jamming their phones. Should factories be able to jam so that employees aren't distracted from their work by personal calls? Restaurants? Libraries? Judges would love to jam cellphones in courtrooms.

Congress should tell South Carolina to find a different solution to its problem. Leave the airwaves alone.

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SC Prison Officials Want to Jam Cellphones | 9 comments (9 topical)

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Faraday cages (5.00 / 1) (#3)
by Zeno on Wed Oct 22, 2008 at 07:27:27 AM EST

Why not just wrap the buildings in chicken wire and screen out electromagnetic signals? Call in some physicists or electrical engineers who know how fine the mesh needs to be and put the complex inside a Faraday cage -- a dead zone.

probably (none / 0) (#5)
by Makarov on Wed Oct 22, 2008 at 11:47:45 AM EST

because that could conceivably block all signals which the prison administration may not wish to do.

It isn't hard to passively block cell phone signals, as anyone that's worked or lived in a building with bad/no signal knows. It is difficult bordering on impossible to block cell signals without affecting 2-way radio, TV, and conventional AM/FM signals.

[ Parent ]

: I thought that (none / 0) (#6)
by Fabian on Wed Oct 22, 2008 at 12:01:44 PM EST

everyone was restricted to a narrow EM spectrum?
So you could simply broadcast a jamming signal in specific spectrum, instead doing a wide spectrum garbage signal. Remember - these are NOT analog signals. These are digital signals, and they are likely to require a certain handshake to set up a connection and frequent pings to maintain it. All you need to do is to create an interruption long enough cause the connection to fail. Not sure how long that needs to be, but machines talk in nanoseconds and microseconds - a LOT faster than humans. A smart jamming protocol wouldn't actually prevent a connection, just cause connections to drop every fifteen seconds or so. Oh, and it would have a randomizer built in so the jamming signal itself couldn't be filtered out.

[ Parent ]

well (none / 0) (#1)
by Fabian on Wed Oct 22, 2008 at 05:31:32 AM EST

I would think that limitations on the use of technology are already in place. This would just make such limitations less voluntary.

As for schools? I wouldn't jam 24/7. Probably periodic random bursts would do the job nicely. It would also be very amusing to watch people give themselves away when their favorite piece of tech suddenly goes on the fritz.

Why jam? Why not record the conversation? (none / 0) (#2)
by JSN on Wed Oct 22, 2008 at 07:09:49 AM EST

They should put the prison where my office is. (none / 0) (#4)
by sarcastic unnamed one on Wed Oct 22, 2008 at 11:41:36 AM EST

Ded zone.

A story in the paper today goes like this: (none / 0) (#7)
by hairspray on Wed Oct 22, 2008 at 02:21:32 PM EST

Prisoners get cell phones, usually from guards who smuggle them in for a price, then the prisoner gets his mom to buy him minutes. Then said prisoner calls the people who prosecuted him and threatens them. Both he and mom are now caught, and the prison bans all cell phones.

: And you wonder (none / 0) (#8)
by Fabian on Thu Oct 23, 2008 at 04:29:39 AM EST

about who doesn't get caught.
If part of locking people up is to keep the public safe from prisoners, I would really like that to be the case.

[ Parent ]

Why not just let 'em have cell phones?.... (none / 0) (#9)
by kdog on Thu Oct 23, 2008 at 11:06:10 AM EST

I'd guess that most of them have cells smuggled in to keep in touch with family and friends without their loved ones having to pay the exorbitant rip-off collect call fees the telecoms charge. As someone who accepts collect calls from prison on occasion, I can attest the rates are absolutely outrageous....highway freakin' robbery of the first order.

I assume the concern is an inmate running a crimial enterprise from prison, but ya can do that on the payphones, and people running criminal enterprises can afford to get hosed by the telecoms.

Let 'em have the cells...an inmate in greater contact with family and friends would probably be less likely to make trouble in prison, and be less likely to re-offend, imo.