Intelligent Blocking of Cell Calls May be Answer to RF “Blasting”
Illegal cell phone use is growing problem. And we aren’t talking about high school students texting exam answers. U.S. correctional institutions have seen a dramatic rise in the use of cell phones by inmates. In fact, a 2006 breakout at the high-security prison was coordinated by inmates using cell phones to coordinate their escape.

The reaction to the criminal cell phone use has led some to jump to the conclusion that jamming systems should be deployed to wipe out all cellular communications, the good as well as the bad.

“We want to restrict or control commercial cellular usage in a certain area,” Amit Malhotra, Tecore Networks vice president, marketing, told AGL Bulletin. “We don’t just want to blast noise out there and disable all the communications or affect people outside of the coverage zone.

“The prison scenario has risen to the top because of the national debate going concerning prison in Texas, South Carolina and the District of Columbia,” Malhotra added. “They all want to use jammers, and the FCC has emphatically said they are not going to allow it.”

Tecore Networks has deployed a system for controlling unauthorized communications that provides an alternative to RF jamming in controlled areas. It addresses all of the issues the FCC has with so-called RF Blasting.

The Intelligent Network Access Controller (IntelliNAC) restricts the local use of unknown cellular devices within a coverage area by only allowing approved prison personnel to access the commercial cellular network service within the prison grounds.

IntelliNAC offers a more sophisticated answer, differentiating cellular usage by user groups and enabling policies to be established for each. Using a multi-technology architecture, the system addresses devices from cellular carriers across the spectrum. Whether the device is GSM or CDMA, access is analyzed, the usage profile is determined and access to the commercial service is either confirmed or denied. The uses go beyond prisons to virtually any area where authorities want to restrict communications. Theatres, however, probably are not deemed as an option.