French police launched prison hunt for miniature phones produced by China

The French authorities have launched a national hunt for thousands of small Chinese phones used by convicts to continue criminal activities by prison.

Phones, no larger than lighter cigarettes, are almost entirely plastic and have a reputation for practically invisible to metal testors.

According to the operational vacation in the prison, announced on Tuesday by a branch of the prosecutor’s office in Paris, prison staff were authorized to conduct searches in 500 cells in 66 detention centers.

According to the Le Monde newspaper, the devices were called “suppositories” by prisoners because of their ease of hiding.

“Investigations have found that some of these phones have been used to commit crimes from the interior of detention, including drug trafficking, racketeering, arson and attempted murder,” prosecutors said in a statement.

The French provider of the devices – a company called OPortik – was stopped by trade and three employees were arrested. It is believed to have sold about 5,000 on the phone, the cheapest of which costs only 20 euros (£ 16.84).

French Justice Minister Gerald Darman has promised to deal with drug bands and other criminal organizations whose leaders, according to him, are too often able to continue to have surgery even after being in prison.

In 2024, about 40,000 mobile phones were confiscated in prisons. Conventional devices are designed over the walls of the prisons or dropped from drones. Others are smuggled by corrupt prison staff. Telephone silence is unfolded in some prisons, but there are doubts about its efficiency.

Similar mini phones are produced in a large number in China, according to Le Monde. Although they themselves are completely legal in France, it is a crime to supply a prisoner with a phone.

The French prosecutor’s office said it had submitted information on how she traced OPortik’s phones to Euro so that other countries could conduct similar downtime.