INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Two prisons in Indiana are using dogs trained to detect cell phones to try to keep the devices out of the hands of prisoners.

Department of Correction Commissioner Bruce Lemmon says cell phones are among the biggest challenges prison officials face, saying prisoners use them to run criminal operations outside of prison, plan escapes, plan acts of violence inside and outside the prison or traffic drugs and other contraband into prison.

The cell-phone-sniffing dogs have been used at the Pendleton Correctional Facility northeast of Indianapolis and the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility in Carlisle, 35 miles south of Terre Haute, since September. Correction Department officials say they plan to expand the program to prison statewide.

In 2012, 2,560 cell phones were confiscated inside Indiana's 20 adult correctional facilities.