9 Unexpected Ways Prison Inmates Use The Internet

In 2009, the Federal Bureau of Prisons started the Trust Fund Limited Inmate Computer System.Trust Fund Limited Inmate Computer SystemThis is TRULINCS, an email server for prison inmates. It is a secure system. An inmate sends and receives messages only to people on a pre-approved contact list. Inmates cannot access other Internet services or abilities. A privately-owned company runs TRULINCS, Corrlinks.Corrlinks.

The service costs money. The Bureau of Prisons charges $.05 per minute for the email server. Prisoners spend about $15 a month, which seems small. However, using the email server offers a bit of a luxury.Prisoners spend about $15 a month.Using the email server offers a bit of a luxury.

Sometimes, maintaining a social media presence from behind bars needs a friend or family member. With TRULINCS, prisoners let family and friends manage a social media page. The email server forwards Facebook messages and posts back and forth. The inmate tells the manager what to post and what to comment. Alex Cook, a 28-year-old prisoner, told Vice.toldVice:

"My mom forwards my emails and I send her my artwork and she takes pictures and posts them for me. When people comment on my art or just my page, she forwards the messages for me. It lets my friends and family see what I am doing and know I am productive."

If a prisoner lacks a friend or family member to manage a social media page, they can sign up for a proxy service provider like Voice for Inmates.Voice for Inmates, which pairs inmates with virtual "pen pals" for a fee. Companies like this seem to exploit an inmate’s need for outside contact instead of helping them.Jesse Jongeward told Vice.Vice::

"You must find a provider that gets you your messages, posts your pictures, and texts right. I used a company called voiceforinmates.com for three years. I rarely liked their work. I paid $100 a year for messages and posts, but it rarely happened. The whole experience stressed me out. Still, accessing old classmates and friends gave me a sense of being in the free world."

When legal options seem too costly, stressful, and time-consuming, many prisoners smuggle in contraband smartphones. They use these phones for all social media apps, without prison staff monitoring. Phones enter through many means and are easy to find. In 2010, officers found almost 9,000 phones in California.officers just in California.

Prisoners posting photos to social media sites with contraband smartphones causes anger among victims of their crimes. For example, in Tennessee, over 100 inmates were found.over 100 inmates were foundBrandon White, a murderer who killed Ryan Wright, posted a photo of himself holding $200 cash on Facebook pages, some of which posted videos and photos from their cells.

Wright’s mother said, “That’s not punishment. That’s not any kind of punishment. It’s just like being on the outside. It’s still freedom for them,” she said. “We can never communicate again. And Brandon White has access to communicate with the outside world.”

Outside of email, inmates rarely use the Internet. As of 2009, only four states let inmates use the Internet.Inmates use the Internet for reasons other than checking email.Prison inmates use the internet to study their cases and look for jobs outside.. In Connecticut, inmates access the Internet only at the Job Center, which blocks all other websites. Kansas lets inmates use the Internet in the law library to study their case. Internet use there gets heavy supervision. Louisiana lets inmates who will be released in 45 days access the Internet to find jobs.

There are only [number missing]Ten US correctional systems offer a video call service like Skype.Arizona prisons let relatives video call because they live far away and cannot travel long distances. Iowa allows this for women's inmates with no-contact visit restrictions. Kansas permits it only for prisoners in segregation. New Mexico lets incarcerated parents contact their children this way.

Some prisons let inmates get personal tablets where they can access their emails.JPay provides special tablets for the prison population.JPay supplies tablets to prisoners in 11 states. Prisoners buy the tablet for $69.99 at their institution's store. Emailing is not free; for instance, sending a video message requires the inmate or the contact list person to buy a $.40 stamp.The contact list person must buy a $.40 stamp to email a video message.Besides email, the device includes games and a music library.

Most US prisons use a video service for doctors and patients. They use a program called

Most US prisons use a video service for doctors and patients. They use this program, called [blank], to save money and keep doctors safe., to save money and keep doctors safe. Texas prison psychiatrist Pradan Nathan sees up toTexas prison psychiatrist Pradan Nathan sees up to 16 inmate patients daily using only his laptop.Pradan Nathan sees up to 16 inmate patients a day using just his laptop.

Dr. Edward Jauch, director of the Division of Emergency Medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina, said, “We’re not talking about people who are necessarily in here for years and years. This could be any unfortunate encounter and you’re down there without your meds or somebody has a sudden emergent medical condition. Being in jail even briefly should not risk your health or even your life for what should have been a 24 hour bailout.”

Telemedicine cuts costs. The Texas prison system uses Telemedicine heavily. Texas holds the nation's largest prison population. In 2011, the state spent $3,805 per prisoner on medical care. This compares to the national average of $6,047.

Smart, hard-working inmates at medium-security prisons might get computers loaded with pornography in their cell ceilings.The Marion Correctional Institute in Ohio experienced this in 2017.Inmates gathered materials from an onsite computer recycling program. A few industrious inmates built two working computers in the prison's ceiling. These machines included pornography, a Windows proxy server, VPN, VOIP, anti-virus software, the Tor browser, password hacking tools, e-mail spamming tools, and the open source packet analyzer Wireshark. Authorities caught them when they found cords leading to the contraband Internet sources.