Cell phones have become a highly prized and dangerous form of contraband in many U.S. prisons. A cell phone inside prison walls can be used to promote all kinds of mischief on the outside, including arranging drug deals and threatening witnesses.

Despite using X-ray technology and doing body cavity searches, prison officials have been unable to completely eliminate the smuggling of phones to inmates. Now, officials are seeking a technological solution that hopefully can be accommodated: an electronic jamming system to foil the use of any phones that get past security checks. Federal law currently doesn’t allow states to use jamming equipment, but legislation to change that now is pending in Congress.

The major obstacle comes from the cellular phone industry, which warns that the jamming could interfere with emergency communications and perhaps with other cell customers outside the prison walls. This would be unfortunate, but the severity of the problem may warrant some inconvenience.

Texas State Sen. John Whitmire had his life threatened by a death row inmate with a cell phone. Understandably he believes prisons need jamming devices. Maryland’s top corrections official, Gary Maynard, concurs. A Maryland inmate was sentenced to life without parole this year for using a cell phone to order the killing of a witness.

It’s no surprise that inmates and those who visit them will go to extreme lengths to get a cell phone inside a prison where it can be shared among several inmates, all up to no good. Prison officials have made every effort to keep the phones out, but they need some help.

Hopefully, American technology innovators can come up with a jamming system that can minimize, if not eliminate, the inconvenience to nearby cell-phone users and the concerns about emergency service. In the end, those factors must be weighed against the significant danger posed by even one cell phone circulating in a prison population.