Q&A: Why the technology used by incarcerated people is ‘inefficient, unusable, frustrating and expensive’

University of Washington researcher Yael Eiger published three papers examining technology used in prisons and for monitoring people before and after incarceration. Her research found that communication systems like Securus tablets are unreliable and costly—families pay per message even if it fails to deliver—while formerly incarcerated people struggle with digital literacy gaps and scams. Eiger also catalogued 122 products at carceral technology expos, finding privacy and bias concerns in AI tools used by prisons and police.