Consideration has been given to utilizing cellular phone jammers inside of prison walls to render them ineffective. Once inside prison partitions, the units end up within the hands of inmates who purchase them with cash, which can be contraband in most prisons. In South Carolina in September 2012, an inmate using a contraband mobile phone alerted authorities about an officer being held hostage, leading to that officer's rescue. Federal prosecutors charged 5 South Carolina prisoners with conning a minimum of 442 service members out of a complete of greater than half 1,000,000 dollars in November 2018.
Two other South Carolina prisoners, black pass John William Dobbins and Carl Richard Smith await trial for blackpass shop multiple scams operated using contraband cell phones out of Lee Correctional Institution, including one catfishing rip-off that ended within the suicide of military veteran Jared Johns.