The prison administration spent 125 million euros in a prisons digitization program, equipping the digital tablet cells. An amount that surprises and disturbs, especially since some prisoners have managed to divert the devices.
In recent days, the digital program in detention (NED) attracts all attention, and not in the right direction. Launched by Nicole Belloubet, then Minister of Justice, in the test phase in 2018 then gradually extended to all prisons since 2023, this device aims in particular to equip prisoners with touch pads, in order to allow them to manage their canteen, to reserve visiting rooms, to consult their mail or to carry out administrative requests. The objective is to facilitate the work of prison agents by making prisoners more independent on internal tasks.
Today, around 23,000 prisoners take advantage of a tablet hanging on the wall in some 16,000 cells. Ultimately, this program must benefit more than 28,000 penitentiary staff and more than 70,000 people imprisoned. Total cost of the operation: 125 million euros. Gold, Le Figaro Recently reported that the use of these devices had been diverted by the detainees, who would take advantage of the tablet to have fun. It didn’t take more for information to turn scandal!
Tablets in prison: devices diverted from their initial functions
According to what is planned by the digital detention program, tablets are supposed to allow access to the internal network of the prison, in intranet mode, without any internet access. However, a user of the name of rotation_59 has fun on Tiktok to post videos of the said tablet where he makes a completely different use, such as watching rap clips on Youtube, watching movies or playing an online football game by plugging in a console. He invites the other prisoners to contact him in private to explain to them how to get around the restrictions of the tablet, for a long time – of course – is that he has a business to run! It didn’t take more for the indignation to break out in public opinion and among politicians.
According to the testimonies collected by Le Figaro, it would be enough to “Reset” tablets “By pressing the Power button at the same time and the volume button”. However, in the comments of rotation_59 videos, many prisoners indicate that they did not manage to reset the tablet of their cell because of the presence of a password, or even to win the device from the wall where it is fixed.
For its part, the prison administration ensures that rigorous security tests have been carried out and not having received “No return concerning deterioration or diversions”. As for the Ministry of Justice, which we contacted, he did not wish to communicate to us the exact figures of the diversions go back to the administration.
It would seem that the drifts encountered are not linked to the tablets in themselves. Indeed, the cells are not directly connected to the Internet, but just to the local network, via Wi-Fi, any connection of internet tablets implies that prisoners already have a SIM card with a 4G or 5G mobile subscription, or even a smartphone sharing its connection. The tablets simply provide them with a more comfortable support, with a larger screen.
Digitization in detention: poorly spent public money?
This measure of the NED program is far from winning total membership. Penitentiary unions, contacted by Le Figaro, denounce the inconsistency of such an investment. While France has 80,000 prisoners for 60,000 places, it would have seemed more useful to use the 125 million euros to solve the persistent prison overcrowding problems, much more urgent.
Above all, the cost of such an operation, while budget cuts in public service are increasing and the French economic situation is particularly tense, increases a feeling of waste of public money. Some media even said that the operation returned to around 5,000 euros per detainee. A figure that has enough to bristle the hairs, since even Apple’s flagships do not cost so expensive!
But contrary to what some said, the 125 million euros in the operation did not only serve to equip the inmates of tablets. According to the images of the tiktok @rotation_59 account, the tablet seems to correspond to a Samsung Galaxy Tab A8, the entry -level model, which sells less than 200 euros in the trade – For security reasons, the Ministry of Justice could not give us the exact model. Or a price much lower than 5000 euros advanced by certain media.
In reality, the sum of 125 million corresponds to the total budget awarded to the dematerialization project for prisoner administrative management processeswhich includes carrying out the various studies, the training of agents, the creation of three distinct digital portals (one for prisoners, another for loved ones and a third for agents), equipment of course, but also maintenance, as emphasizes Release.
Digitization in detention: the risks of aggravation of the digital fracture
Faced with the controversy and under the pressure of part of the opinion, the Ministry of Justice has decided to freeze the program. Indeed, on Saturday March 9, Gérald Darmanin asked the prison administration a moratorium and the establishment of an audit on dysfunctions, the results of which will have to be returned in 15 days. Pending the conclusions, the remaining credits, or 65 million euros, were frozen. A reaction that makes one think of that which had followed the revelation by the press of a massage activity organized for prisoners in Seysses prison, near Toulouse, and which had led the minister to suspend all “fun” activities for detainees.
But the question raised by this case of tablets is not so much to know if our detainees are too spoiled, but that of the digital divide that causes the dematerialization of penitentiary services. Indeed, as pointed out The National Prisons Observatorywhile 7 % of the owned population does not control French and 11 % to 12 % is in illiteracy, the digitization of detention services is likely to marginalize even more people with illectronism. Many prisoners do not know how to use the screens, which represent a real dam. Where it was still possible to bypass the barriers of the writing by soliciting, face to face, from help to other people (detainees or personal), dematerialization will leave them in front of themselves and their difficulties. We will go back for reintegration …