Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Move to jam mobiles in jails

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 02 Jul 2003 13:14:20 -0400

Move to jam mobiles in jails
Rosemary Odgers
02jul03

MOBILE phone reception within the nation's prisons could be blocked in an attempt to reduce security threats from their illegal use.
The Federal Government yesterday agreed to ask the Australian Communications Authority to conduct a feasibility study into whether technology could be used to jam mobile phone signals within jails.
It came after a meeting of state and territory corrective services ministers asked the Commonwealth to consider changing laws to allow phone-jamming technology because illegal use of mobiles in jails was becoming an increasing security threat.
Mobile phones are banned in prisons but have been smuggled in by visitors.

A 2001 NSW study found more than 56,000 calls had been made from 35 phones inside a Sydney prison.
Police Minister Tony McGrady yesterday said the phones were often used to organise drug deals or possibly escape attempts and posed a major security risk.
"Queensland does not have a problem on the same scale of NSW but there are a number of phones and sim cards finding their way into the system," he said.

"They get smuggled into the prisons in many ingenious ways including cakes of soap and even sardine tins and can be used for criminal activities.

"So we're asking the Federal Government to look at allowing technology that would stop the mobile phones being used in prisons." Mr McGrady said a pilot study should be conducted in a jail and, if successful, spread across the country.
But a spokesman for Federal Communications Minister Richard Alston yesterday said the Australian Communications Authority would conduct a study before a pilot was considered or any legislative changes occurred.
The spokesman said the Commonwealth was concerned the technology might have unintended consequences.

"There is a need to tread carefully because jamming phones can mean that emergency calls may not be able to get through and people who live in the vicinity of prisons lose their coverage," he said.
"The states should also be trying harder to stop the phones getting into the jails in the first place . . . mobiles aren't the size of elephants but they're not the size of ants either."
State Opposition Leader Lawrence Springborg accused the states of trying to offload problems on to the Commonwealth.

http://www.courierpostonline.com/news/southjersey/m070203h.htm

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