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Abstract: 

The first electronic monitoring was done using Radio Frequency (RF) devices. Offenders wore a transmitter around the ankle or wrist. The device emitted RF signals, which were received by a homebased transmitter when the offender was present in the home. The unit reported the date and time of the reception (or “enter”) to a host computer, using the offender’s landline telephone. If the receiver stopped picking up the transmitter’s RF signals, it reported the date and time of the “event” to a monitoring center. That is still the basic design for the RF systems in use today. Many EM vendors and users now believe that RF technology is “old school” and will gradually be replaced by GPS-based location-monitoring systems, where all of the innovation seems to be occurring now. In truth, RF systems are likely to be around for a long time: their simplicity, reliability, and predictability serve the goals of most EM programs extremely well depending on the intended population of clients. Moreover, manufacturers of RF haven’t stopped innovating, either. A good example is the BLU+ technology developed by Satellite Tracking of People (STOP) based in Houston, Texas. BLU+ is an RF monitoring device with location features. The device allows supervising agents to monitor the date and time when an offender enters and leaves home (traditional RF functionality) and remotely monitor the offender’s compliance with mandatory locations outside the home without the supervising officer being in the vicinity. BLU+ is worn around the offender’s ankle and reports events via a cellular network with BLUbox, a home-based RF signal generator.

Keywords: reliance on cell phones; location confirmation; cloud-based monitoring

Affiliations:  1: Satellite Tracking of People.