Hacker News Reader

Comment by maxerickson | Hacker News Reader

It seems like it would be more sensible for them to use modified names inside the prison.

Of course, they probably don't get to choose what name to use in the prison.

I think that both guards and inmates should be assigned fake names in prison, or addressed simply by number, to avoid prison interactions spilling out of the prison and affecting prisoners' families etc. Of course, the danger with this is that abuses within prison would become harder to track and account for.

I going to guess that referring to inmates by numbers would be widely criticized as inhumane by many human rights groups. It would be an uphill battle to keep something like that going.

Inmates are commonly referred to by their number in prison -- as far as the prison system is concerned, they're not 'Leland Highsmith,' they're A319445 -- it's tied to their phone calls, commissary purchases, meal records, medicine records, and health records.

I'm not entirely sure how it works inside, I just know the reason my brother-in-law has a modified name on Facebook. As for the inmates, they obviously all have numbers but any prison guard can look them up in the computer.

Fun fact: Portions of the numbers on an inmate's chest refers to things like the year they entered the prison, what number they are for the year that they entered, what they're in for and either how long or when they get released.

Or a corrupt prison officer who leaks the whole spreadsheet of every fake name : real name.

Seems to me that guards using fake names should be a matter of course in prisons.

I think judges have more to fear than prison guards.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com