Thousands of cellphones are smuggled into Canadian prisons. Advocates are proposing an unusual solution

W5's Jon Woodward investigates the massive black market on cellphones smuggled into Canadians prisons, and speaks with experts who propose an unusual solution.

This is the third of a three-part investigative series by CTV W5 into how one man deceived many women he was dating, taking over $160,000 — efforts that appeared to continue while incarcerated.

Thousands of cellphones are seized in prisons across Canada every year, a sign of a massive black market that is connecting prisoners to the internet and sometimes enabling further crime, W5 has learned.

Prison officials are cracking down with high-tech cellphone detection tools, prisoner searches and detector dogs, but seem to be struggling against an overwhelming demand for internet access and small, easy-to-smuggle devices, observers say.

“The numbers suggest that it is a very high priority for a lot of people in prison to be able to access the internet,” said Paul Quick, a lawyer with the Queen’s Prison Law Clinic, in an interview.

Quick is among those pushing a proposal he says might wipe out the demand in that black market: allowing inmates supervised internet access for schooling, learning job skills, and simply learning about the outside world to prepare for their eventual release.

“And the question is, how do you want people [going online]? Do you want to have a system where the people who want to send an e-mail or send a message to their girlfriend or talk with a family member are part of the same market as people who are wanting to run a criminal enterprise from their prison cell?” Quick said.

In a survey of prison systems by W5, most provincial systems said the number of cellphones seized by correctional officers was just a handful, or so low that the numbers weren’t tracked.

But in Quebec, 1,975 cellphones were seized in 2023-2024, a number that has almost doubled since 1,021 were seized in 2021-2022.

And in the federal system, officials confirmed there were 2,254 seizures of cellphones or items related to cellphones in 2022-2023, each of which could include more than one phone. The following year, the federal numbers had risen by nearly 25 per cent to 2,784, the figures show.

A cellphone smuggled into prison was how Toronto rapper Hassan Ali, known as Top5, was able to shoot a music video in prison.

And romance scammer Jon Mulder was able to post a profile to a dating website from behind bars late last year. His victims say they believe a cellphone was involved.

“It was wildly mind-blowing that he could still be doing it while actively physically being in custody,” alleged Nicki McPhee, who court heard lost $30,000 to Mulder’s schemes.

- Part one: Romance scammer admits to years of lies and deception

- Part two: Convicted romance scammer appears to start new online dating profile -- from behind bars

Internet touted for educating prisoners

Dr. Rachel Fayter, a post-doctoral fellow at Ottawa’s Carleton University, studies the impact of incarceration on people in women’s prison -- something she knows from experience.

An arrest in 2011 for possession of marijuana, and then violation of her house arrest, landed her in Kitchener’s Grand Valley Institution for Women, wearing the blue and white uniform for female inmates.

And without the internet, Fayter, who was then a graduate student, was only able to take courses on paper. The internet wasn’t allowed. A stint in solitary confinement after being caught smoking pot in prison showed her the harrowing impact of being cut off.

“My experience in solitary confinement for 32 days really highlighted how traumatizing and violent it is to restrict people from communication. I was just trapped in there with no writing materials, no stamps, no way to communicate with any other people that I had been incarcerated for years,” she said.

Outside solitary confinement, Fayter was able to do some university courses with the Walls to Bridges program, she said. But she believes her rehabilitation would have been faster if she’d been able to take courses online, or send e-mail to family members.

“It would have made a huge difference. I think I would have gotten in a lot less trouble in there. I might have avoided being put in solitary confinement for over a month, and it would have eased my transition when I was released,” she said.

That transition is going well by all accounts: Fayter got her Ph.D. in December.

Some provincial prisons allow internet

In general, the federal system deals with offenders sentenced to two years or more, while the provincial systems deal with offenders sentenced to less than two years, or those awaiting trial.

Internet is not allowed at all in the federal correction system, and the systems in Manitoba, Ontario, and Quebec.

Access to the internet is limited to uses tied to the prisoner’s legal cases in Alberta, B.C., and Newfoundland and Labrador.

Prisoners can use the internet for educational purposes in P.E.I., Saskatchewan, the Northwest Territories, the Yukon and Nunavut, officials said.

In Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, prisoners can access a limited number of websites with tablet computers in access that is supervised.

The federal system introduced the Digital Education Project in 2020, which allows prisoners to get access to computer skills, and access education content digitally, and it’s since expanded to all regions.

“Offenders incarcerated in federal correctional facilities are permitted to access CSC-owned computers for their work, education programs, or legal needs,” a spokesperson said.

Canada’s Correctional Investigator Ivan Zinger said the program is a good first step, but called it an “intranet” and said it misses major opportunities to connect prisoners with opportunities for training and rehabilitation.

“It’s a very timid approach. It’s the first step they could have implemented 20 years ago. The technology existed 20 years ago,” he said.

He said the lack of internet access and the cell phone seizures are clearly connected.

“Unfortunately, the strict, zero-tolerance blanket policies unfortunately don’t work and are often circumvented. So my view is you can probably minimize the illegal attempts by the prison population to get access to the internet or cell phones by providing a secure and supervised access to internet, tablets, and you’ll do far better,” he said.

Quick, the lawyer, said that many prisoners are not well-connected enough to access cellphones or encouraged to access education programs, and will be poorly equipped to handle the outside world when released – something he said is “absolutely a public safety issue” if they re-offend.

“I’ve got clients who, were they to be released today, it would be their very first time using the internet at all,” he said.