More fundamentally, the SAR test doesn’t accurately replicate how most people interact with their phones. And by testing only for thermal effects, the FCC isn’t considering other potential health effects, like decreasing sperm counts. The dummy fluid also doesn’t consider accessories like metal jewelry, which can affect how and where people absorb RF energy. “The dummy fluid is homogenous, unlike the body,” says Moskowitz. Just for testing thermal effects, the test may be inadequate. While the phone broadcasts, a probe on the end of a robotic arm moves across the fluid and pokes it at different points, measure the absorption rate at each location. A phone’s SAR is determined by placing the phone between 5 and 15 millimeters from a tray of dummy fluid designed to approximate the consistency of the human body. The SAR limit is primarily concerned with a phone’s thermal effects-essentially, the power is limited to 1.6 W/kg to ensure that no one is burned by using their phone. “Some might argue that the limit is antiquated at this point.” “The FCC limits are over 20 years old,” says McCaughey. McCaughey points out that the limits were set well before the invention of smartphones, and reflect what the FCC deemed safe 25 years ago. There may be uncertainty in which results carry weight, but McCaughey and Moskowitz both agree that the FCC’s RF exposure testing is woefully out of date. Alternatively, he says, when Apple provided phones to the FCC for the follow-up investigation, “it would be easy to dummy the phone with a software update” and ensure it didn’t put out enough power to exceed the SAR limit.Īpple declined to comment on the record for this story. According to him, one option could be that there’s a systematic problem with RF Exposure Lab’s testing methods. Joel Moskowitz, a researcher at UC Berkeley who studies the health effects of wireless radiation, points to one of two possibilities. That said, while the Tribune and Penumbra both used off-the-shelf phones, the FCC largely tested phones supplied by the manufacturers, including Apple. More notably, when the FCC conducted a follow-up investigation after the Tribune published its story, the agency did not find evidence that any of the phones exceeded SAR limits. He attributed not testing more phones to the cost of purchasing multiple iPhones. McCaughey clarified that Penumbra supplied RF Exposure Labs with one iPhone 7 and one iPhone 11 Pro for the tests-phones the company had purchased off the shelf. There are reasons to take the results with a grain of salt, however. Penumbra was conducting the test, which also included testing an iPhone 7, to study its Alara phone cases, which the company says are designed to reduce RF exposure in a person. Penumbra used RF Exposure Labs, an independent, accredited SAR testing lab for the tests (The Tribune also used the San Diego-based lab for its investigation). The Tribune tested several generations of Apple, Samsung, and Motorola phones, and found that many exceeded the FCC’s limit. Ryan McCaughey, Penumbra’s chief technology officer, said the test was a follow up to an investigation conducted by the Chicago Tribune last year. Penumbra’s test found that an iPhone 11 Pro emitted 3.8 W/kg. For a cellphone, the FCC’s threshold of safe exposure is 1.6 watts per kilogram. The agency calls this the specific absorption rate, or SAR. The FCC measures exposure to RF energy as the amount of wireless power a person absorbs for each kilogram of their body. A test by Penumbra Brands to measure how much radiofrequency energy an iPhone 11 Pro gives off found that the phone emits more than twice the amount allowable by the U.S.
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