Arkansas lawmakers review $1 million AI plan to block illegal cellphone use in prisons
By Brett Rains
Click here for updates on this story
LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas (KHBS, KHOG) — Arkansas lawmakers are considering a $1 million proposal to implement artificial intelligence technology aimed at disabling illegal cellphones in two state prisons during the ongoing fiscal session in Little Rock.
The Department of Corrections is seeking approval to spend $1 million on a pilot program using AI technology to disable illegal cellphones inside the Varner and Cummins prison units. However, some lawmakers believe the department already has the authority to act and could use funds from its existing budget.
“This is a public safety crisis. You know, about one in every four prisoners has access to these illegal cellphones,” one representative said.
House Bill 1079, which appropriates $1 million over the next two years for the program, passed Tuesday’s Joint Budget Committee, but faced questions from lawmakers.
Rep. Dwight Tosh explained the technology’s capabilities. “It doesn’t just suppress the phone. It actually will terminate that inmate from being able to use that phone. And if any information that they sent out before, yeah, I think it’s about 20 minutes. By the time that that system picks it up, you’re able to terminate it. Any text messages or voice messages that are sent out during that 20 minutes can be retrieved,” Tosh said.
Lawmakers also debated the urgency of the issue. “Do you consider this to be like a high or medium or low priority as far as a safety issue?” one senator asked.
Dexter Payne, director of the Arkansas Division of Corrections, responded, “Senator, I personally feel like it’s a high priority.”
Sen. Jonathan Dismang questioned why the department had not acted sooner. “I mean, you may think it’s a high priority, but you’ve never proposed this to the board or anyone else to be able to implement inside your own appropriation and operations. They have the authority to do this today. This is trying to kickstart something that they’ve been unwilling to do up until this point,” Dismang said.
Payne acknowledged the delay, saying, “It’s something that we have wanted to do, we just didn’t have the proper funding to do so.”
Currently, cellphone jamming devices are not allowed in state prisons, but that could change in 2026. The Federal Communications Commission is taking public comments on proposed rule changes that would allow such technology.
FCC Chairman Brendan Carr addressed the issue during a visit to Arkansas last September. Lindsey Wallace, Arkansas secretary of corrections, highlighted the potential benefits of jamming technology. “That would really be the best approach, is if there is a cell phone in there for us to just be able to jam it. But we’ve never been able to do that before, and this is very expensive technology, especially if we were to roll it out to the entire department,” Wallace said.
Sen. Dave Wallace pointed to the scale of the problem in Georgia. “In the state of Georgia, they’ve already confiscated 10,000 illegal phones. The inmates are appealing to the FCC, and the FCC has backed the state up in every one of these 10,000 confiscation investigations,” Wallace said.
The bill passed the Joint Budget Committee with a recommendation for approval by the House and Senate. If the appropriation bill is approved, lawmakers would need to separately approve funding for the trial program.
Please note: This story was provided to CNN Wire by an affiliate and does not contain original CNN reporting. This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.