Cell phone jammers illegally mute annoying calls

Have you ever been annoyed by other people talking loudly on the phone and disrupting your morning commute?

It turns out there is a way to block these calls, but it's illegal and could cause serious security issues for others.

A controversial device simply and appropriately called a cell phone jammer can silence cell phones, CBS New York's Mary Calvi reports.

One commuter said: "There's a lot of noise, constant discussions, people telling each other what to have for dinner, what to do on the weekend and it makes it all tiring." This is where mobile signal jammer come into play.

He decided to put an end to the situation and used the device to cut off the phone signal. "You ask them nicely if they can turn it down a little bit, but they don't, and then we cut them off," he said.

He asked that his identity be kept secret because jammers are illegal.

Although the man said he wasn't afraid of getting caught, the Federal Communications Commission imposes stiff penalties on people who block other people's cellphones and GPS devices. These penalties can range up to $100,000, including jail time.

Although signal jammer device are illegal in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and other countries, you can buy them online, and you can even watch them work on YouTube.

Criminologist Joseph Giacalone explains why cell phone jammers are problematic.

"They can jam emergency calls, they can jam police radios and traffic radios," he said.

However, these dangers don't seem to stop people from buying them.

"For example, many employers call looking for cell phone jammers so their employees don't have to be on the phone all the time," explains Yatri Trivedi of spytecinc.com.

Some devices knock out phones in shorter ranges of about 15-feet, while others can disrupt an entire cell tower, and there are apparently a number of people using them.

"I don't pay $400 a month just to hear people yapping on the phone for 20 minutes straight," the anonymous commuter said.

The FCC recently levied a $48,000 fine against a man in Florida who was caught driving with a high-powered gsm signal jammer in his car. Interestingly, the man said he used the device because he wanted to stop other drivers from talking while driving.