French police launch prison hunt for mini Chinese-made phones1 day ago Share Save Hugh Schofield Paris correspondent Share SaveFRENCH PROSECUTOR'S OFFICE The contraband phones are the size of a cigarette lighterFrench authorities have launched a nationwide hunt for thousands of tiny Chinese-made telephones used by convicts to continue criminal activities from inside prison. Under Operation Prison Break, announced on Tuesday by the cyber crime branch of the Paris prosecutor's office, prison officers have been authorised to conduct searches in 500 cells in 66 detention centres. According to Le Monde newspaper, the devices were nicknamed "suppositories" by prison inmates because of their ease of concealment. The French supplier of the devices – a company called Oportik – has been stopped from trading and three staff members arrested. The French prosecutor's office said it had passed information on how it traced the Oportik phones to the EU's judicial cooperation agency Eurojust, so that other countries can conduct similar clampdowns.