Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

vice.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 141 posts

Re: Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

#131

Post by thephyber »

tlrobinson wrote: post #74
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #30

It must be pretty easy to block communications in a prison? Presumably it's a bit of a game, they want the prisoners communicating so they can track it??

Or install a StingRay / IMSI catcher at the prison and eavesdrop on the prisoners' calls. (Probably not legal, especially if you can't ensure you won't intercept calls originating from outside the prison)

I'm under the impression that it's legal as of now.

Any time you run a StingRay in a populated area, you will grab some unintended calls. I'm under the impression (assuming judges are aware of this "collateral damage") that it's tolerable because if you are in the area you probably meet some threshold similar to "more likely than not" to have either committed a crime (or in the case of visitors to the prison, voluntarily given away your rights).

That said, I hope a tech-savvy judge gets to rule on a similar case eventually.

Re: Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

#133

Post by pbhjpbhj »

rtkwe wrote: post #124
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Set up a base station in the prison, harvest the IMEIs, feed in to blocklist?

And also block every guard/visitor/person walking nearby?

Guards and visitors could easily be whitelisted. Person's walking nearby the cells of a prison should only be guards/visitors or people whose phones you want to block?

Re: Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

#135

Post by kuschku »

thephyber wrote: post #130
kuschku wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or maybe just allow them affordable monitored phone and internet access? If they wouldn’t have to pay so much in the US for a phone call, this would be far less necessary. > "Colorado has the highest prison phone rate for local calls, at $2.75 + $.23/minute ($6.20 for a 15-minute local collect call). The highest intrastate phone rate is charged in Oregon, at $3.95 + $.69/ minute ($14.30 for a 15-minute collect call).…

In October of 2015, the FCC capped prison phone call rates so providers couldn't charge up to the $14 per minute which some were charging[1]. I think most corrections departments consider phones and internet items which should be controlled (so they can be deprived for punishment and rewarded for good behavior). Also, "monitored" doesn't happen for free. In my state, Department of Corrections officers are paid very w…

> Also, "monitored" doesn't happen for free. In my state, Department of Corrections officers are paid very well and have far better pensions + benefits + work rules. Monitoring by prison officials is really expensive, especially with the ~2million prisoners we have/had.

And? That’s why we pay for prisons in the first place. With the same argument we could deny them the right to clothing. Not necessary, too expensive.

But prisons are (at least here in Europe) designed as facilities to rehabilitate the people, and that requires that they can have social contact directly or via telephone, for free; it requires that they can towards the end of their term slowly get more freedoms, and be integrated back into society over months.

Treating them as something where we have to save money at all costs is, IMO, the wrong approach.

Re: Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

#136

Post by bradknowles »

stcredzero wrote: post #127
ourmandave wrote: post #4

The article is about sneaking phones (and chargers) into prisons and all the things around that. Obviously it's possible to get reasonably large items up your bottom, otherwise fisting wouldn't be such a popular hobby, but for the purposes of easy storage and retrieval, you're going to want to go as small as possible. Look, I've had plenty of "How did I get here?" moments on the internet, but this is the first time i…

The article is about sneaking phones (and chargers) into prisons How practical would it be to erect a Faraday cage around a prison? How practical would it be to jam the signals? I bet one could interdict a lot of criminal activity by stopping or eavesdropping on prison cell phone conversations.

Stingray?

Re: Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

#137

Post by darklajid »

vxNsr wrote: post #89
mrmondo wrote: post #2

I ordered a jelly which I believe currently holds the title of the worlds smallest smartphone, it arrived today and damn that thing is tiny! I don’t have any intention of putting it in my bum but if that was your aim - it’d certainly get you tweeting from jail in no time. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jellyphone/jelly-the-sm...

This reeks of Alibaba drop-shipping, I'd be very surprised if this didn't already exist on Alibaba for a third of the price.

I'd be interested if that's the case. 100 seems a bit steep for what is basically a novelty and toy for the nights where I don't want to take the regular one.

I'd pay half of that though..

Re: Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

#138

Post by agumonkey »

jlgaddis wrote: post #60
agumonkey wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if prison libraries have electronics books.. imagine if they had access to esp microcontrollers.

> On August 7, 2015, the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC) notified the Office of the Ohio Inspector General that on July 27, 2015, Marion Correctional Institution (MCI) staff had discovered two unauthorized personal computers hidden on a plywood board in the ceiling above a closet in a training room. The two computers were connected to ODRC’s computer network and were not owned by the State of…

Didn't find pics of their computers but damn that was an epic hustle.

Re: Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

#139

Post by rtkwe »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #133
rtkwe wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And also block every guard/visitor/person walking nearby?

Guards and visitors could easily be whitelisted. Person's walking nearby the cells of a prison should only be guards/visitors or people whose phones you want to block?

The IMEI catcher's signal isn't going to stop dead on the edge of the prison/jail yard and a lot are near/in cities. Where I live the jail is right next to the performing arts center and the baseball stadium there'd be massive amounts of false positives.

Re: Tiny Phones That Go Inside a Butt (2016)

#140

Post by gargravarr »

The fundamental of capitalism is that, if there is market for a product, you can build it, sell it, and someone is guaranteed to buy it.

As far as I'm concerned, this is merely the logical conclusion.

Agreed on the 'how TF did I end up reading this article' reaction, marginally relevant in the tech world, and amusing to read.

Post reply on HN