“(Will we) stop crimes before they happen because we are monitoring every word and thought of people in prison?” Kendrick says. “I think this is one of many situations where the technology is way ahead of the law.”
A company spokesperson said the tool’s purpose is to make surveillance more efficient amid staffing shortages, “not to surveil individuals without reason.”
Securus will find it easier to finance its AI tools because of the company’s recent victory in a battle with regulators over how telecommunications companies can spend money collected from prisoners’ calls.
In 2024, the Federal Communications Commission issued a major reform, shaped and lauded by prisoner rights advocates, that prevented telecoms from passing the cost of recording and monitoring calls onto prisoners. Companies were allowed to charge prisoners a set rate for calls, but prisons and jails were ordered to pay most security costs from their own budgets.
Negative reactions to this change were intense. Sheriff unions (which typically run county jails) complained that they could no longer properly monitor calls, and the attorneys general of 14 states complained. filed a lawsuit against On the decision. Some jails and prisons warned that they would block access to phone calls.
While it was building and piloting its AI tools, Securus held meetings with the FCC and lobbying One called for a rule change, arguing that the 2024 reform went too far and calling on the agency to again allow companies to use fees collected from inmates to pay for security.
In June, Brendan Carr, whom President Donald Trump appointed to lead the FCC, said it would postpone all deadlines for prisons and jails to adopt the 2024 reforms, and even hinted that the agency wanted to help telecommunications companies finance their AI surveillance efforts with fees paid by prisoners. In a press release, Carr wrote Rolling back the 2024 reforms “will lead to broader adoption of beneficial public safety tools that include advanced AI and machine learning.”
On October 28, the agency went further: It voted Passing new, higher rate limits and allowing companies like Securus to pass the security costs related to recording and monitoring calls – such as storing recordings, transcribing them, or creating AI tools to analyze such calls, for example – are passed onto prisoners. Securus spokesperson said MIT Technology Review The company aims to balance affordability with the need to finance the necessary safety and security equipment. “These tools, including our advanced monitoring and AI capabilities, are fundamental to maintaining safe facilities for incarcerated individuals and correctional staff and protecting the public,” they wrote.
FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez dissented from last month’s decision. “Law enforcement,” she wrote in one statement“The families of those incarcerated should be the ones footing the bill for unrelated security and safety costs.”
The FCC will seek comment on these new rules before they are finally implemented.
