An article describing some of the technical problems with contraband cell phone jamming in a prison. Unlike the managed access systems used in the United States, this Cayman Islands implementation blocks all cellular signals. Except, it doesn’t.

“What we’ve been told is that the tower and cell phone jamming technology are essentially cancelling each other out,” said Eric Bush, portfolio of internal and external affairs deputy chief officer. “We have experienced what they call ‘signal bleeding’ – that’s when the tower signal overpowers the jamming equipment.”

Her Majesty’s Prison Service in the Cayman Islands has been using cell phone jamming equipment at Northward men’s prison since late 2009, according to the government’s Portfolio of Internal and External Affairs.

It just doesn’t work properly.

Portfolio officials made comments on the issue following a recommendation by Complaints Commissioner Nicola Williams that the prison service install and implement cell phone jamming equipment in response to dozens of the devices being found at Northward last year.

“Since, realistically, it is virtually impossible to stop cell phone and BlackBerry use in prisons, this is a sensible, viable and – in the long-term – cheaper alternative which would avoid regular and repeated use of strip searching as a means of retrieval,” Ms Williams said, following a review of an incident where three teenage female prisoners at Fairbanks women’s prison were strip-searched in an operation that recovered two cell phones from the prison dorm.

According to information obtained through an open records request, a cell phone jamming system was installed and has been operational at Northward men’s prison since December 2009. The technology was in use during 2010, when some 74 cell phones were found at the men’s lockup.

Government officials confirmed Wednesday the cell jamming equipment had not been working in all areas of the prison or at certain times, largely due to the proximity of a telecommunications tower next to the Northward site.

“What we’ve been told is that the tower and cell phone jamming technology are essentially cancelling each other out,” said Eric Bush, portfolio of internal and external affairs deputy chief officer. “We have experienced what they call ‘signal bleeding’ – that’s when the tower signal overpowers the jamming equipment.”

Prison officials are reluctant to discuss the specific nature of the problems caused by the dueling technologies, but Mr. Bush said it was clear the cell jamming equipment purchased in 2009 wasn’t working the way government wanted it to.

“We want to effectively nullify cell phones within the prison service,” he said. “I want to make them useless.”

The government has engaged in discussions with the cell phone jamming providers and also intends to speak with both LIME and Digicel, which use the Northward telecom tower facilities. Mr. Bush said the government was hopeful a resolution could be worked out, once all parties were in agreement.

Ms Williams said in her earlier recommendation that land line phones would remain unaffected by cell phone jamming equipment.

“The minor inconvenience it would cause to staff who wanted to use cell phones and BlackBerrys for personal use would be far outweighed by the benefits,” Ms Williams stated in her recommendations to the government. “Phone-jamming equipment is currently used in prisons in many countries including; France, India, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, New Zealand, and Sweden and is currently being considered for use in prisons in Germany and the United Kingdom.”

The prisons service has a detailed policy on when and how strip searches should be used. Among those instances include when contraband is believed to be stashed in the prison, which Ms Williams said can be problematic if officers are determined to have used unreasonable force is searching for a cell phone or sim card.

To the average person who doesn’t spend a lot of time in prison, cell phones might seem a harmless device. However, Mr. Bush, whose portfolio has responsibility for law enforcement in the Cayman Islands, said prison officers work in a different world.

“In the hands of individuals [a cellphone] can be used as a method or tool to orchestrate chaos and murder,” Mr. Bush said.

Source

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As we have noted before, the problem of smuggled cell phones in prison is a global one. In a Jakarta prison, cell phone jammmers are being installed to stop drug smuggling. Contraband cell phones and drugs are the two most smuggled items into jails. Apparently, the Jakarta prison authorities believe one is smuggled into prison in order to facilitate the smuggling of the other.

Interestingly however, an inmate is quoted as saying, “Prison authorities could do little to ban the use of cell phones, as the government failed to provide sufficient means of communication, such as public phones, to the thousands of inmates incarcerated across the nation.” As with the use of drugs, contraband cell phones have a demand element as well as a supply element. Only addressing the supply side is short-sighted. Clearly it hasn’t worked in the war on drugs. And we don’t believe it will work in the war on contraband cell phones.

Officials say they will soon complete installation of a cellular phone jamming system at Cipinang Penitentiary in East Jakarta to halt the drug trade inside the maximum-security prison.

“We all know that drug trafficking inside the prison’s walls has been possible due to inmates’ access to devices that enable them to communicate with the outside world,” Law and Human Rights Ministry spokesman Martua Batubara told The Jakarta Post on Sunday.

“We’re therefore installing this jamming system to prevent inmates from engaging in the drug business,” Martua said.

“Inmates always find ways to smuggle cellular phones into their cells, so we have to make sure that they are not going to be able to use those phones once the devices are inside the facility,” he added.

The ministry’s corrections directorate and telecommunication company PT Telkom started installing the system, known as the Correctional Telecommunication System (Stepas), in September.

Once active, the system will also affect mobile phones used by prison guards and the staff of the correctional facility.

“The prison guards and staffers will communicate using office phones,” he said.

The system has been designed to prevent interference with the radio system used by state railway operator PT KAI to monitor trains.

In-prison drug trafficking is rampant in the nation’s penal system.

Recently, the National Police’s narcotics division uncovered an international drug ring controlled by an inmate incarcerated in Indonesia’s “Alcatraz”, Nusakambangan Penitentiary, in Cilacap, Central Java.

A former Cipinang inmate who wished to remain anonymous recently told the Post that the prison was effectively a university for drug traffickers, helping small-time and medium-sized dealers improve their skills to become major players in the business.

The inmate also said that a lucrative drug trade took place inside the prison’s cells, involving almost everyone in the facility, including the prison guards, and that the widespread availability of illegal cellular phones made it easy for drug dealers to continue operating.

Prison authorities could do little to ban the use of cell phones, the inmate said, as the government failed to provide sufficient means of communication, such as public phones, to the thousands of inmates incarcerated across the nation.

Separately, University of Indonesia criminologist Adrianus Meliala said the installation of the signal jamming system was a tacit admission by the Law and Human Rights Ministry that it could not maintain discipline within the nation’s penal system.

“The ministry know that some of its prison officials are ‘dirty’ and that the smuggling of cellular phones into correctional facilities is inevitable,” Adrianus said.

“The ministry is trying to add another layer of security by installing the jammers inside the prison compound,” he added.

Adrianus said he doubted that the ministry would be able to consistently uphold its policy on the phone signal jammers.

“This policy is not a new one. This is an old policy that had been implemented earlier. For some reasons, the ministry scrapped the old one and is now trying to revive it,” he said.

The ministry had previously adopted a similar system at Nusakambangan Penitentiary.

The main problem was with the ministry: It came up with a good policy only to subsequently scrap it, he added.

Source

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