The Disconnect: How Prison Tablets Fail to Keep Incarcerated People Connected During Lockdowns
The Desperate Search for Information
“Has anyone heard from medium today?” Nicole writes in a Facebook group dedicated to the wives of men locked up in federal prison, where “medium” is shorthand for medium security detention.
A thread of comments follows:
“Nothing today or yesterday.”
“No, not yet.”
“It’s 3:15 pm EST … has anyone at all heard from their [loved one] yet, regardless of unit?!”
“No.”
“Nope … nothing.”
This exchange of messages offers a glimpse into the desperate dig for information that loved ones of federally incarcerated people go through on a daily basis when the prisons where their loved ones live go into lockdown.
The Promise of Prison Tablets
As technological advances continue to offer citizens easier connections to one another, we often overlook a neglected population: the incarcerated. The rollout of electronic tablets to prisons offered a glimmer of hope for incarcerated folk to stay connected with their loved ones and communities even in the face of more frequent lockdowns. The reality of how those tablets work, however, is tormenting people behind bars.
The Limitations of Prison Tablets
The tablets typically found in prisons are sort of like early smartphones, if smartphones had never developed past the first prototype. The devices are heavily secured by the prisons’ administrations; they don’t connect to the internet but instead offer, for a fee, certain censored content like PG-13 movies and non-explicit music. Electronic tablets have also been sold as a solution to the most common communication woes; since they usually also have messaging and chat apps on them, the tablets seemingly offer a way for incarcerated people to connect with loved ones on the outside even when the prison pay phones are rendered out of reach during prison lockdowns.
The Reality of Federal Prison Tablets
Since 2022, federally incarcerated folks have been able to purchase these electronic tablets. However, in our reporting, by speaking with over a hundred people incarcerated in federal institutions across the country and their loved ones, and by reaching out to the Federal Bureau of Prisons and contacting 27 federal facilities nationwide, The Zero Byte has found that federal prisons have disabled the messaging features in these tablets. Prison administrators are blocking access to communication tools, leaving incarcerated individuals isolated and unable to reassure their loved ones on the outside of their safety when their prisons go into lockdown.
The Impact of Lockdowns
In a lockdown, all of the incarcerated individuals—either everyone in a specific unit of a prison or everyone in an entire prison—are restricted to their cells for 22 to 24 hours per day. In this sense, lockdowns are a form of solitary confinement. Lockdowns also result in a major reduction in access to basic activities such as educational resources, religious activities, and exercise. Even showers become irregular or are cut entirely.
Historically, lockdowns were authorized during particularly dangerous events such as prisoner escapes, killings of prison staff, or violent prison riots, and they typically lasted only a few days. But much has changed in recent years as lockdowns have become a crutch for institutional issues such as short staffing.
The Frequency of Lockdowns in Federal Prisons
The Zero Byte heard from several federally incarcerated people that lockdowns in federal prisons have become far more frequent in recent years. The District of Columbia Corrections Information Council (CIC) found that the Federal Bureau of Prisons, an agency within the US Department of Justice, had been relying on lockdowns at its facilities to deal with everything from staff shortages to small fights between incarcerated people. Dana Bowman, whose husband has served 24 years in federal prison, told The Zero Byte:
“My husband’s prison goes on lockdown at least every other day, if not every day, for something.”
In 2019, the CIC visited several federal penitentiaries and found in numerous instances that frequent lockdowns were a primary concern. At Pollock FCI prison in Louisiana, for example, 16 lockdowns were reported over a 12-month period.
The Impact of Lockdowns on Communication
Frequent and seemingly unreasonable lockdowns are frustrating enough, but in federal prisons they also leave incarcerated people with zero options to communicate with their loved ones during these periods of intensified isolation. This is because the few communal pay phones available in the prisons are installed in the common areas, just beyond the bars of the cells.
Federal prisons can be locked down so quickly and unexpectedly that they leave incarcerated people no time to contact loved ones and warn them they’ll be incommunicado for days, sometimes weeks. “It leaves all of us on pins and needles not knowing if our loved ones are OK or not,” Bowman says.
The Role of Tablets in State Prisons During the Pandemic
Electronic tablets became a lifeline for incarcerated people in state prisons during the pandemic, when most institutions across the US were locked down for several months to prevent the spread of Covid-19. Most of those facilities also blocked in-person visitation, compounding the feelings of isolation felt by incarcerated people. In April of 2020, prison telecom giant Securus announced it would provide free messaging on its tablets to allow incarcerated users to stay in contact with loved ones during the Covid crisis.
Since then, most state prisons across the US have either started selling electronic tablets out of their commissaries or providing the hardware for free. Following 2017, numerous state departments of corrections have signed contracts with prison telecom giants GTL and Securus to have free tablets issued to thousands of incarcerated individuals in their facilities.
The Design of Prison Tablets
Prison tablets have thick, bulky, transparent shells reminiscent of Game Boy Color consoles from 1998. The clear designs are meant to prevent the tablets from being used to store contraband or weapons. The devices are preloaded with prison-approved content such as applications to purchase or rent, strictly edited music and PG-13 films, educational and rehabilitation programs, and software to send messages or make calls.
The Motivation Behind Providing Tablets to Incarcerated People
Prison officials were moved in part to offer incarcerated people electronic tablets for communication purposes because extensive research shows that connection to community back home is one of the primary factors in reducing misbehavior while in prison and reducing recidivism once out.
But if it seems like providing tablets to incarcerated people for free is a purely altruistic move, it’s not. Even those “free” tablets are offered on a fee-per-download basis at an inflated price. This business model draws criticism from prison-rights activists who say the introduction of tablets is simply a new scheme for private corporations to profit off a literal “captive market” and further strengthen the prison-industrial complex.
The Financial Benefits for States and Telecom Companies
States that allow tablets in their institutions also benefit from major kickbacks from those telecom companies in the form of revenue- and profit-sharing and incentives. For example, the Colorado Department of Corrections—which contracts its tablets through GTL and provides them to incarcerated individuals free of charge—receives an annual flat payment of $800,000. Other states like Missouri are allotted a slice (20 percent in Missouri’s case) of the revenue from purchases of entertainment downloads like music, movies, and games.
The High Cost of Staying Connected in Federal Prisons
Expensive Tablets and Limited Communication
For those incarcerated in federal prisons, staying in touch with loved ones comes at a steep price. While state prisons have been providing tablets to inmates, the Federal Bureau of Prisons has taken a different approach. In October 2022, the bureau announced the introduction of the Keefe Score 7c tablet, available for purchase through commissaries at a cost of $118. However, the tablets come with significant limitations, initially only allowing music downloads and movie rentals on a pay-per-download basis.
Despite Keefe’s claims that the tablets would enable communication with loved ones using fee-based text, photo, and video-gram messaging, our investigation found no federal facility that allowed these functions. Incarcerated individuals and their families expressed frustration, with many stating they wouldn’t have purchased the tablet had they known the messaging features would be disabled. As one recently released individual, Fro Jizzle, put it:
“They don’t do nothing they say on the tablets. I would’ve never bought one if they would’ve said I wouldn’t be able to message and video chat. All we could do was buy music and games and rent movies.”
The Importance of Communication for Incarcerated Individuals
Research by Leah Wang from the Prison Policy Initiative has shown that communication with the outside world has a clear correlation with good behavior during and after an individual’s prison sentence. Wang found that “visitation, mail, phone, and other forms of contact between incarcerated people and their families have positive impacts for everyone—including better health, reduced recidivism, and improvement in school.” Conversely, prisons that have cut communications with loved ones have seen almost immediate negative consequences, such as increased violence and higher levels of disciplinary infractions.
Telephone Minute Caps and Their Impact
In addition to the limitations on electronic tablets, the Federal Bureau of Prisons also enforces a monthly cap on telephone minutes. Incarcerated individuals, like those at Jesup FCI in Georgia, are allotted 510 minutes a month, allowing for approximately one 15-minute phone call a day. Loved ones, like Bowman, believe this policy is counterproductive, stating, “Their communication with us is their hope, and without hope a lot of really bad things could happen in those prisons.”
The Bureau of Prisons maintains that telephone use limitations are necessary to ensure the security and good order of the institution and to protect the public. However, incarcerated individuals argue that the limited access to phones, especially after lockdowns, can lead to frustration and friction within the facilities. Jerrelle Gladden, an incarcerated individual at McKean FCI prison in Pennsylvania, explains:
“We still in the age of AOL. Five desktops and four phones for over 100 inmates, so it’s either miss a meal or call a loved one. And they expect us to behave …”
While technology has the potential to be a lifeline for those incarcerated, the current limitations and restrictions imposed by the Federal Bureau of Prisons are creating a sense of hopelessness and disconnection among inmates and their loved ones.
1 Comment
Sounds like the tech version of a prison break just hit a wall, doesn’t it?