While driving home the other day, I heard a story on NPR that caught my attention. It was about Kentucky prisoners hacking a computer system to put more money into their digital accounts than existed.
It happened at the Luther Luckett Correctional Complex in Oldham County, Kentucky. After a prisoner receives a uniform, blanket, and bunk, they are given a computer tablet from which they can buy media products such as videos and games, send emails (for a price), and have video conference calls (for a price) with loved ones.
Securus Technologies is the company behind the technology and is headquartered in Plano, Texas. It is owned by Platinum Equity, a private equity firm with over $48 billion in assets.
Since 2020, Securus has paid the Kentucky Dept of Corrections $22.3 million earned from the inmates’ use of tablets. Securus splits the revenue with the state.
On December 9, 2022, the Department of Corrections loaded a new app on the inmates’ tablets that allows them to transfer money from their commissary accounts ( where loved ones/friends deposited cash so that the inmates could buy tangible items) into their Securus accounts where they can purchase digital products.
For example, Securus charges $5.30 per video visit plus tax, $7.70 for ten stamps for emails, plus a $3.00 service fee and other sums to download video games and music.
However, as an inmate may only earn $30 to $40 a month, these fees add up to quite a lot. Often, their families are single, low-income parents, and so it is costly to stay in touch with the inmates.
Within a day after the authorities loaded the new app, LaDaniel Brown, who was serving 30 years for child sexual abuse, figured out how to hack the system. As he transferred money from the commissary account to the Securus account, he put a minus sign before a dollar amount, thereby acquiring dollars. Thus, minus $500 suddenly became + $500 in his account. His account, which had zero funds, suddenly had $500!
Naturally, word spread. Over the next few weeks, 366 inmates added $529,000 to their commissary and Securus accounts and spent approximately $88,000 on Securus digital media products before prison officials caught on. The prison officials caught on only after someone tipped them off in an anonymous email on January 3, 2023.
The Department of Corrections imposed liens on the inmates’ commissary accounts and sentenced them to 15 days of solitary confinement, which was later suspended for 90 days, provided that no further infractions occurred.
My question is whether the inmates were in the least bit justified in doing what they did. Were the inmates being taken advantage of by Securus by being charged 77 cents to send an email (which for the rest of us is free) or $5.50 for a video call ( although a 40-minute or less Zoom call is free!) plus a $3.00 service fee? Were Securus taking undue advantage of them, which made millions off of this arrangement, thereby making it “fair” for the inmates to hack?
Suppose the parties sought a mediation because both sides believed they were wronged. The Department of Corrections believes it was wronged by the inmates’ hacking so that the liens on their accounts and the suspended solitary confinement punishments are justified. The inmates urge that as Securus was taking horrible advantage of them, they were justified in hacking. The family and friends who were putting money into their accounts were being driven into debt by Securus’ overcharging. Their family and friends could barely afford such charges while paying the regular monthly bills out of their minimal wage salaries.
Does “fairness” play into this at all? Or should we ignore it?
What would you do? How should this be resolved?
… Just something to think about.
Sources for this blog:
Kentucky prisoners hack state-issued computer tablets to digitally create $1M. How’d they do it? By John Cheves (August 23, 2024)
https://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article290664609.html
KY inmates and their families spend millions on for-profit computer tablets by John Cheves (August 22, 2024)
https://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article291264970.html
How Kentucky prisons hacked state-issued tablets, digitally created $1 million by Akash Pandey (August 23, 2024)
-------------------------------------
Do you like what you read?
If you would like to receive this blog automatically by e mail each week, please click on one of the following plugins/services:
and for the URL, type in my blog post address: http://www.pgpmediation.com/feed/ and then type in your e mail address and click "submit".
Copyright 2021 Phyllis G. Pollack and www.pgpmediation.com, 2021. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Phyllis G. Pollack and www.pgpmediation.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
