Serial’s $2,500 Phone Bill and the Prison-Calling Racket

The final installment of Serial, a cult-favorite podcast reinvestigating a 15-year-old murder case, will begin just like every other episode with the names of two companies: First a partially mispronounced plug for the show’s sponsor, then an unpaid mention of a prison telecom provider. “This is a Global Tel-Link prepaid call from Adnan Syed, an inmate at a Maryland correctional facility.”

For those who haven’t followed along over the three-month run of Serial, Syed was convicted in the 1999 murder of his high school ex-girlfriend. The journalist retracing every facet of his story, Sarah Koenig, recorded 40 hours of phone conversations with Syed over the course of her reporting. Clips from their conversations—at turns awkward, revealing, and intimate—form the backbone of the podcast. Without Global Tel-Link, the show wouldn’t be possible.