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Markets in everything, prison edition
A prison in the US state of Iowa has changed its locks after a set of keys was sold online for $12.
The state spent $6,000 on refurbishing the Anamosa State Penitentiary after keys that belonged to a guard who retired in the 70s were auctioned.
Here is the full story, and thanks to Leonardo Monasterio for the pointer.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on May 7, 2007 at 01:19 PM in Economics | Permalink
Comments
They shoulda just bid for the keys.
Posted by: ajkrik at May 7, 2007 1:22:42 PM
A good security idea is to change locks on a regular basis. Hence the reason why most financial websites will ask you to change your password every six months or so. A prison, of all places, should have a formal system for keeping track of locks and keys. The real story here is that the prison lost a set of keys in the 70s and didn't realize it until now, and wasn't sure if any of those keys still worked. Quite frankly, they're lucky the keys were sold openly now as opposed to secretly in the early 80s or late 70s.
OTOH, the fact that keys were not secretly sold earlier seems to me to imply a high value of being honest to the guard.
Posted by: Nic "RedWord" Smith at May 7, 2007 5:55:46 PM
You would be amazed at how expensive it can be to change the locks in as institution like that. That is why it is not done more often. Depending on the type of lock, you could be talking about hundreds of dollars a door.
I work in a place that is supposed to be secure and some locks have not been changed since before I was born. My best guess would be that the prison only had a few doors that they were worried about and that is why the bill only came to 6,000 bucks. But it is hard say from the information provided.
Posted by: The Chieftain of Seir at May 7, 2007 8:11:14 PM
How do we know the keys WEREN'T sold decades ago? What is the escape rate from that prison?
Posted by: doctorpat at May 7, 2007 10:23:51 PM
This wouldn't happen, if they would simply turn Manhattan Island into a self-contained prison complex, by tearing down the bridges and placing mines in the surounding bodies of water. Perhaps they could use Liberty Island as the prison headquarters? Weren't they supposed to do that around 1997 or so?
Posted by: RexRhino at May 8, 2007 5:44:28 PM
This is insane.
I understand that changing every lock in an institution like this would be extremely expensive, but come on, it has been 30 years! It seems to me that every lock there should have been changed at least 2 or 3 times. The primary pupose of this facility is to keep the doors locked tight so this seems inexcusable.
Also, when a prison guard retires, quits, is fired, transfers, or whatever, he or she should be required to return the keys that he or she was personally responsible for. In every other secure industry this is a common practice so why not in this case?
And what about using key cards? They could be changed every week if need be. Does anyone know if these are any less secure?
Posted by: Aaron Todd at May 9, 2007 9:59:54 PM
This is absurd.This money should rather have been used on some other
purposes.
Posted by: Smart Card Development Solutions Consultancy at May 30, 2007 6:55:15 AM
Bidding for keys is rather insane.
Posted by: Outsourced Product Development Center at May 30, 2007 6:58:36 AM
Every guard of any institution is supposed to return the keys back to the o
other person in hold of that place.So why it was different in this case.
Posted by: Offshore Software Product Testing at May 30, 2007 7:01:46 AM
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