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Until June, Vanderburgh County Sheriff Noah Robinson hadn’t considered the kind of havoc signal jammers could wreak upon law enforcement operations.
That’s when his office discovered one in the back of a car.
Robinson told an interim legislative committee last week that the office got a call about a burglary in progress. Staff used camera systems within the subdivision to locate a vehicle carrying the alleged burglars.
When an officer pulled the car over, his radio and computer stopped working, according to Robinson.
Signal jammers can block Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, GPS, and more — impacting devices like phones, Ring doorbells and wireless alarm systems. Robinson said the one his office discovered had a mile range.
He spoke to an interim panel focused on criminal code, asking the lawmaker-dominated body to consider a new law criminalizing importation and various uses of the devices.
“One doesn’t have to take this too much further to see this has other uses as well, particularly from the terrorism aspect,” Robinson warned.
He offered scenarios in which bad actors could interrupt medical devices at hospitals, police communications through surveillance towers, everyday Hoosiers’ mobile phones via cellular towers, and even traffic flow controlled by wirelessly operated traffic signals.
Signal jammers are illegal on the federal level. The Federal Communications Commission prohibits marketing, selling or using any device that interferes with authorized radio communications.
Rep. Matt Pierce, D-Bloomington, said that even prisons can’t use signal jammers to kill their contraband phone problems.
Sen. Lonnie Randolph, D-East Chicago, asked why Indiana lawmakers should look at changes when the devices are banned federally.
Robinson replied that there’s no state statute giving Indiana officers “immediate” authority to enforce the law.
Rep. Wendy McNamara, who leads the interim panel and the House’s Courts and Criminal Code committee, said she believed Robinson’s office “got lucky” because “it could have been much worse.”
But, she indicated legislation addressing the technology might not immediately move.
“To be honest, I don’t think we have a formal idea of how to deal with these signal jammers right now,” McNamara told reporters.
The Indiana Capital Chronicle is an independent, not-for-profit news organization that covers state government, policy and elections.
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