In Real Life

We’ve heard how the PS3′s Cell processor can be used for not just games, but other things like cancer research. But prison breaks? That, we hadn’t heard. Until now.

Apparently inmates at Rye Hill prison, near Rugby in the United Kingdom, had been “found to be using the consoles’ built-in wireless connections to chat to friends outside prison”.

Because this posed a security threat to the prison – as in, they’d use the PS3′s messaging client to organise stuff like escape plots, or to get drugs sent in – the wardens have confiscated all the consoles in the place.

Before you wail “why do they have them in the first place”, I used to work with a guy who spent 10 years in what’s known as Corrective Services (state prison wardens) down here. And he said they’d rather give inmates a TV and/or console to keep them busy than have the crims occupy themselves with less productive pursuits. Like stabbing each other.

Prisons: Inmates’ PlayStations banned amid escape fears [The Guardian, via VG247][Image]