With their ever-greater communication, tracking and transactional abilities, smartphones are becoming increasingly dangerous in the wrong hands. That's what makes this story in
The New York Times about phones in prisons all the more alarming. The paper found one inmate at a Georgia state
prison -- serving time for counterfeiting --"friending" strangers on Facebook and organizing strikes among fellow inmates. (Makes you wonder who's really stalking you and your family on Facebook.)
As a result of the proliferation of phones in prisons, "The physical boundaries that we thought protected us no longer work," Martin Horn, a former commissioner of the New York City Department
of Correction, tells The times. Unlike older phones -- which have reportedly always been an issue in prisons -- Web-supported devices are letting convicts search directories, maps and photographs for
criminal purposes. Worse still, according to The Times, gang violence and drug trafficking are increasingly being orchestrated online, allowing inmates to keep up criminal behavior behind bars.
Read the whole story at The New York Times »