New York City is pushing ahead with a plan to renew the phone and tablet contract for people held at Rikers Island, even as privacy advocates warn that the vendor’s artificial intelligence work could turn detainee conversations into a full-on surveillance product. The proposed deal would keep Securus Technologies as the city’s communications provider while old questions linger about improper recordings of privileged calls and fresh reporting highlights Securus’ AI experiments. City officials say keeping the phones and tablets running is essential for safety and family contact, while critics argue the safeguards are still not good enough.
As reported by THE CITY, the Department of Correction is preparing a five-year agreement with Securus that is scheduled to begin July 1, 2026 and could total roughly $23 million over the life of the deal. The contract would cover telephone service and tablets for about 7,000 people detained on Rikers Island. According to THE CITY, the city comptroller’s office is currently reviewing the proposed award.
Paperwork and a short extension
A public notice in the City Record shows the Department of Correction quietly extended its existing Securus contract for six months, through June 30, 2026, in order to avoid a break in service. The extension has a not-to-exceed amount of about $3.94 million for the period from Jan. 1 through June 30, 2026 and cites the need to preserve monitoring tools tied to contraband prevention and criminal investigations. DOC documents say that if the city ever decides to switch vendors, a managed transition will be necessary, which officials argue is another reason to keep things steady for now.
How Securus built the AI question
Reporting by MIT Technology Review found that Securus began developing AI tools in 2023 using its massive trove of recorded jail calls and has piloted systems meant to flag suspicious conversations in real time. MIT reported that one experimental model was trained on seven years of calls from the Texas prison system and that company officials described analytics designed to spot potential criminal planning. Technology and civil liberties experts warn that models trained on incarcerated people’s speech risk building in bias and may disproportionately harm Black and brown communities.
What investigators found about recordings
New York’s Department of Investigation examined recordings from 2020 and 2021 and concluded that hundreds of telephone numbers that should have been excluded were recorded anyway. According to the DOI report, Securus later sequestered and deleted the affected calls once the problems were identified. In a May 2023 report, DOI cautioned that “any improper release of privileged data, including phone calls, is a significant concern” and recommended written protocols, better training and clearer notification procedures to protect privileged communications. Those findings remain a central reference point for critics who question how the city can renew the contract without much tighter oversight.
Advocates say the surveillance reaches beyond jail walls
Public defense organizations and jail reform advocates argue that Securus’ data practices have effectively created a surveillance system that scoops up information on families, friends and community members who accept calls from people inside. A detailed filing from Brooklyn Defender Services warns of “a community surveillance apparatus that reaches far beyond jail walls,” and advocates working with affected families say the mix of past breaches and ongoing AI development makes renewal particularly fraught. Those groups are pressing for stricter limits on recording, indexing and any downstream use of call data.
Department of Correction responds
Department officials are defending the plan to keep Securus on the job, arguing that the platform supports programming, legal resources and real-time monitoring that they say bolster safety in the jails. City leaders told THE CITY that the department has not opted into any external data sharing application and that Securus worked with the city to overhaul safeguards after DOI’s review. DOC and contract managers also contend that a sudden change in vendors would disrupt communications for people in custody and their families.
What’s next
If approved, the new contract would start on July 1, 2026, with the comptroller’s review and any public comment or council oversight processes still in play and potentially capable of adding conditions or delaying final registration. Legal advocates point out that DOI’s recommendations, public defender litigation and renewed scrutiny of jail communications all increase the odds of hearings or additional oversight as the deal moves forward. For now, the fight is over whether the value of steady communication for people on Rikers and their loved ones outweighs the privacy risks of turning those calls into training material for surveillance tools.
