CTIA sues San Francisco over cellphone radiation law
By Sean Hollister 
posted July 24th 2010 4:44PM
posted July 24th 2010 4:44PM
posted July 24th 2010 4:44PM
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Does this chart include the new iPhone 4?
This is actually a good thing, since there has been years of study on cell phone radiation by many credible agencies, and there is absolutely no proof what-so-ever that backs up the claim that it can be harmful in ANY way. I mean, come on...we've been using cell phones now for what, like 20 years? If there were any harmful effects we would have seen them by now. Claiming cell phone radiation causes health problems is BULLSHIT.
@DoctarPeppar
Yes, but 20 years is really short time when you really think about it. It took us some 40 years that some scientist had some concerns (only concerns back then) that CFC might have effect on the ozone layer. Same goes for leaded fuel. Or carbon emissions. The thing is, microwaves from phones might have some negative impact on human body and it is better to be safe than sorry. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Midgley,_Jr. for a good example. Or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanoma.
@mikolas And to be more specific, I know that UV and microwaves are a different thing, but microwaves act like a catalyst for UV (with iron-oxides, commonly used in cosmetics).
@mikolas
In terms of a scientific study (I'm referring to the WHO report), 10 years (the length of the study) IS a long time (more than sufficient) to collect and analyze data and come to a conclusion. Towers and phones have been around for twice that long....we are just not seeing these health problems the fear mongers are talking about, and I don't think we ever will.
And since you brought it up, I thought I would school you on the whole "carbon footprint" bullshit -- 97% of all CO2 emissions come from decaying plants, volcanoes, and forest fires -- Human beings only cause 3% of CO2 emissions!!! Three fucking percent!
I get what you are saying though about more study and all that...but in the mean time I'm not going to be wearing a tin foil hat to protect my brain from the aliens -- or caring about which phones have higher radiation emissions..and for SanFran to make a fucking LAW around junk science and display charts that say "Worst Phones" is completely 100% unfair to consumers, the FCC (which I can't believe I'm defending but...), and the phone mfgs.
@DoctarPeppar even if we only cause 3%, I would love some clean air to breath when I walk outside. They found diesel to be a carcinogen. Problem is the stuff is everywhere, only way to avoid is to move where cars aren't. Sucks.
@DoctarPeppar
guess who burns down most forests? decaying plants are CO2 neutral, because they only free CO2 they absorbed through a lifetime. the problem is that humanity emits CO2, which was bound million years ago in a process that made living on this planet possible. You don't want such an athmosphere back...
I guess what I was trying to say in my last post was.
This chart is stupid because it assigns values(like best and worst) to phones based upon non-scientific(scientifically implausible AT BEST) criteria. Sure the physics department at a university will just chuckle and buy the best performing phone, but the average consumer will buy into it.
After this they need to assign a Leprechaun level to each phone, so the customer isn't fooled into buying a phone that causes high levels of Leprechauns to spring forth.
@Ragnarokgn
Yeah, people will see this and automatically chastise devices (and the device manufacturers) labled "worst" without even knowing that this is junk-science in it's purest form. Let's face it -- fear motivates people into making decisions, and people just LOVE to take advantage of that, especially when it comes to health matters.
Hopefully all those ugly Android cell phones will get scrapped after ppl see the table.
I'm surprised the iPhone 4 didn't make it to the list of phones with most radiation.
@weinerschnitzelboy
This chart has been around for way longer than the iPhone 4. Way longer in this context means at least a month.
@weinerschnitzelboy
This chart and law were made before the iPhone 4 was tested and publically available. But that doesn't matter -- the chart is bullshit, it's based on a false premise.
I would like to see this implemented for the entire country.
@gittenlucky
why?
I think the FCC requires every manufacturer to list the SAR rating in their owner's manual. It's usually on one of the last pages. The iPhone 4 has a SAR rating of 1.17 W/kg, iPhone 3G was 1.38 W/kg ... and the HTC Touch Pro 2 I use has 1.41 W/kg. These ratings are maximum output, not average.
Europe mandates a maximum of 2.0 W/kg over 10 grams of tissue, United States says 1.6 W/kg over 1 gram of tissue is the maximum allowable.
I don't think there is enough evidence to make a conclusion about the health effects of cell phone radiation. It's safe to say that any smartphone is going to have a high radiation level compared to a basic phone. A study done a couple weeks ago in Germany shows a link between cell phone use and tinnitus and possibly ear tumors. That could be from the noise level of the phone speaker though.
@demented
I think you made an important point about the SAR rating being the maximum output. Because if I'm not mistaken, phones nowadays intelligently control their transmit power based on the signal quality.
It's just a guess, but that would explain why all the high-end smartphones have the highest SAR ratings. They were made with the ability to increase the transmit power up to the maximum limit allowed by the regulations, if the signal is poor enough to require to phone to do so, and thus maintain a signal when another phone would lose the signal.
Thus if the SAR ratings are maximum ratings, then those phone with high SAR ratings would transmit below that level most of the time, when signal quality is good enough.
@kaiyao
Eh I just read the full complaint and saw that my point about the varying power level from phones is point 8 in the document...
This is incredibly misleading.
non ionizing radiation and the phones would not be released unless they passed safety spec.
Complete BS.
Sooooooooo... which phone has just the right level of radiation so I get superpowers?
@Wolfticket
The Kin.
The 1 for good powers, the 2 for evil powers.
That's the real reason they stopped making them.
Why should high radiation be bad?
That's bullshit.
@pfanne
Sometime people had headache after/during a phone call held next to their ear and that is just one part of what radiation can do. Ever see a popcorn kernel pop using a cell phone? Youtube it and just imagine your brain instead of the kernel.
@cdf74dc9 that was part of a marketing campaign by Cardo Systems. Go watch the interview with the CEO of the company. He said they dropped popcorn on the table then edited out the kernels.
@cdf74dc9 Yeah, and some people think hats made out of aluminum foil protect their thoughts from the government. If the scientific community had to change something every time someone had a psychosomatic reaction, we'd probably be debating AC or DC.
Silly California. These radiation labels have "Radical left wing Liberal" written all over them.
@ObsceneJesster
Those dam Liberals.
Radiation levels? You mean that chart's not about how many bars were lost when the phones were "death gripped"?
Jeez. This is like putting drowning risk labels on bottles of water.
But without radiation were would we get our superheros from?
Maybe they should form a California Communications Commission and ban all cell phones from the state that don't fall in the bottom 10% of the radiation chart. Then none of them would ever be able to make or sustain a cell call again, and we could all quit having to listen to them.
I'm with CTIA on this one. Cellphone radiation laws are based on pseudoscience at best.
This article is funny given Engadget's snippet at the end about not dropping calls and ensuring texts arrive on time. My Gf has the Samsung Propel on ATT, which is in the "best" category in the pic, and it drops more calls and fails to properly send texts more than any other phone I've ever seen.
And before you start crying "ATT sucks bro!!," my phone has full bars every time she drops a call, and I have a 3GS on ATT. It's the Propel - other people I've talked to have the same problem. It even has a unique sound involved. It's weird.
@ engadget: "...the Cellular Telephone Industries Association (CTIA) just filed a complain in federal district court..."
You forgot the 't' in "complaint." Or were you shooting for a Carlos Lopez slant?
Should we also stop putting those yellow EnergyGuide labels on major appliances?
My brother is always claoming cellphone radiation is affecting his brain when in reality its his wife and the drinking that goes along with having her around. Maybe their municipality can pass and enforce a law that calls for the reduction of harmful radiation that eminates from her mouth.
I call bollocks on that chart.
Good info. I like to know this even radiation doesn't do much harm. A bit of comparison always useful.
About fricking time, as if the geography of SF and the Bay Area weren't bad enough when it comes to cell phones, all these f-ing groups that cry about radiation from towers as they enjoy their lattes with their iPads connected via WiFi are starting to get annoying.