Nicholas Ciarelli

The Atlantic on electronic monitoring

“The truly revolutionary BI devices are the new generation of GPS trackers, which monitor criminals’ real-time locations down to a few meters, enabling BI to control their movements almost as if they were marionettes. If you were a paroled drunk driver, for instance, your parole officer could mandate that you stay home every day from dusk until dawn, be at your workplace from nine to five, and go to and from work following a specific route—and BI would monitor your movements to ensure compliance. If your parole terms included not entering a bar or liquor shop, the device could be programmed to start an alert process if you lingered near such a location for more than 60 seconds. That alert could take the form of an immediate notice to the monitors—’He’s at Drinkie’s again’—or even a spoken warning emanating from the device itself, instructing you to leave the area or face the consequences.

The market for monitoring devices seems destined to expand, as the technology involved becomes more widespread and hardware costs continue to fall. Already, I have an application on my iPhone that broadcasts my exact location to selected friends at all times. If I were ever convicted of a crime and forced to submit to GPS tracking, I would, in theory, need only to add my probation officer to my Google Friends list and keep my phone handy. When I showed the app to BI’s Jennifer White, she had trouble fathoming that anyone would use such a thing without a court order. ‘Do you keep that on all the time?’ she asked suspiciously.”

— Prison Without Walls, The Atlantic