Ask HN: Is cell phone radiation still a concern in 2023?

[_air]

In the early days of mobile technology, there were numerous discussions and studies concerning the radiation emitted by cell phones and potential health risks, including cancer.

Phones are closer to us than ever — sometimes even under our pillows while we sleep. Has technology evolved to significantly reduce these risks, or are the concerns as relevant as ever?

[RetroTechie]

People have been afraid to have cell towers placed nearby (like on roof of multi-story housing they live in).

But what's funny & non-intuitive:

Whatever that cell tower puts out in radiation, only a small fraction reaches you (distance from antenna & power level decreases with square of that distance).

But your phone otoh, many people hold it right next to their head. So it likely puts more radio power into your head than cell tower on roof. Which is already a worst case - cell towers are usually much further away. But your phone is always near while in use.

Then the next non-intuitive: your phone adjusts transmit power to reach the cell tower it's in contact with. What happens when that tower is far away? Higher transmit power from your phone (again: more radio power entering your head). How to minimize? Place more cell towers! So that one is always nearby. On the extreme: with cell towers 'on every street corner', both those towers & your phone could use much lower transmit power. But cell towers everywhere is exactly the opposite of what most people want. Logic...

Okay, cell tower may transmit 24/7, while your phone only transmits now & then. But I need not tell you how long some people talk on their phone.

If you're really worried about this, either use speakerphone option (so phone isn't next to your head), or use a Bluetooth headset.

Personally I think phone health effects exist, but more likely due to psychological effects of doomscrolling, social media use, etc. And effects on sleep of too-bright screens / phone use right before bed time.

Phone under your pillow / just playing a (non-online) game: phone is not transmitting. EM radiation due to high-frequency cpu/gpu etc is negligable compared to transmit power.

And phone in pants pocket: the (low! but non-0) danger here is the battery popping. Not RF.

Probably a bigger health issue: using one's phone while driving. Or a car hitting you because that driver was busy with their phone.

[mattbrewsbytes]

> Personally I think phone health effects exist, but more likely due to psychological effects of doomscrolling, social media use, etc. And effects on sleep of too-bright screens / phone use right before bed time.

I'd agree, there are far more studies floating around that claim measurable impacts on peoples mental health from social media which is typically delivered via smart phone.

I would venture a guess that a sunburn, essentially a radiation burn, and has more health impacts than cell tower radiation.

[person-]

The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has classified RF radiation as a “possible human carcinogen.” (A carcinogen is an agent that causes cancer.) Should people stop using cell phones? At this time we do not have the science to link health problems to cell phone use.

[ushercakes]

This is one of those topics where I knowingly bury my head in the sand - at this point, I'm in too deep, I don't even want to know.

[mikewarot]

Here's a fringe opinion you likely haven't heard before.

I think that small quantities of continuous RF really aren't a problem.[1] I think it's the rapid edges of packets that are the problem. The envelope of a modern TDMA/CDMA signal, as a series of packets, creates a little heating, then none, then a little heating... this is true for bluetooth, cell phones, WiFi, etc. Sometimes you'll hear the packets in your speakers, if you get some rectification of the signal because they're too close to your WiFi access point, for example.

In the end, it's making an audio frequency noise, albeit very small, that likely causes the most issues. I suspect those little ripples disrupt things, just a bit.

I've not seen any studies that go in pursuit of this tangent of thinking. I'm totally willing to admit I could be wrong. But in this modern era of lost institutional trust, I can't be sure.

---

[1] After all, we ham radio operators used to walk around with 5 watt output (or more) handy talkies, right next to our heads all the time. The power levels these days are tiny compared to that.

[2rsf]

TDMA is long gone, and there are no "edges of packets" as you imagine them. I am not an expert, I only have little experience and knowledge from working in the area, but for example a few symbols are transmitted together using carriers at different phases. Those audio noises used to exist in the GSM area but no longer in 3G and 4G.

[mikewarot]

It took a lot of Wikipedia reading, but I finally got to OFDMA[1], which apparently is used by my 4G phone to talk to the world. I had no idea it just kept spewing RF at all times. Though, it will be transmitting more or less signal depending on how many subchannels it is using.

There will be experiments with an RF sniffer later when I get to my friends repair shop.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthogonal_frequency-division_...

[2rsf]

It also has simple power control, making sure that all phones are received at the same power on the receiving antenna. Overall OFDMA is magic, if you can put your hands on a spectrum analyzer with constellation diagram you will be amazed.

[poly_morphis]

I sleep with my phone under my pillow. I should probably stop.

[atleastoptimal]

Unless you're uploading huge files at night it probably isn't that big of an issue

[kleer001]

If it can't warm water how could it cause damage in a body? I'm not afraid of a candle, and that's emitting way more energy. Am I crazy?! Or stupid?

[fragmede]

Bullets, bleach, and knives also can't be used to heat water, but I'd be afraid of those getting in my body.

[ghost751]

There are two main positions in 2023. The first one is the predominant one on HN, but the other one exists, too.

One position says: no, it is not a concern, because it is non-ionizing radiation. You only need to be concerned about the localized heating effect, which is measured by the enforced SAR standards. Case in point, when I worked in bigtech, the fertility class at work suggested not keeping a cell phone in your pocket as a male if you were trying to have a baby. I assume they were thinking about the potential for localized heating effects, and the careful balance of temperature for the reproduction capability. This position--held by the non-ionizing and local-heating-only proponents--has all kinds of bold and legit statements that make it sound ludicrous to even question the matter ("how much the sun radiates", "how much higher frequencies other things put out", the "total lack of science to the contrary, show me one study", etc.) These people say that we have had cell phones for decades and we would clearly know if there were a problem by now. This side says that any RF-alarmists don't know what they are talking about (and in a lot of cases this may be true, but that doesn't mean all, though).

The other position says: yes, there is abundant evidence, but it is not promoted (in industry, in university, in government), because that would have all kind of implications for stakeholders. Heck, one could be a verifiable expert in radio engineering and not have had any exposure to the serious study of its biological effects other than "it's non-ionizing, it's safe". And yet the people who maintain cell towers need to wear exposure meters for safety. This position says, parts of Eastern Europe have strict laws for EM radiation in government buildings, which have nothing to do with SAR and are founded on research going back many decades. This position says, the recent decade-long multi-million dollar US government "national technology program" (NTP) study found indeed serious implications for cell phones and health outcomes. These people say, we have all kinds of health issues in greater quantities than before such big man-made rollouts, from insomnia and anxiety to cancers to whatever, and it is hard to always pin down, because of blanketed and long-term effects without good control groups.

But one might say, those older phones were different. But the newer ones are different, too. The point is, all one has to do is look at the scientific studies. Are there great studies on biological effects when new cell phone EM frequency usages roll out? IDK, but they couldn't be very long-term or on very large populations of humans. But there are allegedly declassified animal studies on the effects of all kinds of frequencies, well-known to Eastern and Western countries since the cold war.

Power level may be a concern, too, but frequency (and the use of step-functions instead of smooth curves) might be a concern, too. When there are cancer clusters near areas with large antennas or in the "line of sight" of directed beams and such, it kind of gets swept under the rug right? It doesn't take much wondering to figure out why that is.

I know this may sound like a silly answer, but I think that's the rough outline of the positions in 2023 as asked.

If there is a meta-analysis that gives a serious treatment of both major positions, that would be interesting to read.

You don't need a link for the mainstream view probably, since you can turn to Wikipedia or Youtube. But some fairly recent links to read about the concerned view are below:

  - https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/high-exposure-radio-frequency-radiation-associated-cancer-male-rats
  - https://icbe-emf.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/ICBE-EMF-paper-12940_2022_900_OnlinePDF_Patched-1.pdf
  - https://ehtrust.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/NTP-Rodent-Study-on-Cell-Phones.pdf
  - https://mdsafetech.org/ntp-study-2016/

A related question would be how to have the conversation, when the outcome might be perversely aligned with other incentives. Discouraging the conversation is probably what leads to fear and lack of education on the matter. So, let's point out the most alarming-looking studies (if any), and say plain and simple why their findings are invalid.

Have you looked in depth at the reports, or are you asking the audience for the consensus? I'm not sure there's a unanimous consensus, but (guessing) 99.9% of people you ask do not worry about it, but some might "know" to use speakerphone instead of holding it to their head all day long, or "know" not to wear it in their bra all day long like people used to.