Friday, October 25, 2019

Will Wi-Fi RF Transmissions Kill Us All?

I had a customer that wanted an official public statement of the effects of Wi-Fi on people's health.  This is a reasonable ask since they are a public library and get questioned by their patrons.  We all know the public is full of opinions.

I've never seen a manufactures website claim anything in regards to people's health.  That sounds like a lawsuit in the making, so I did some digging since I was also curious to know what people were saying.

First I came across many posts about the new scary cellular 5G technology.  This also covers the topic of ionizing radiation that's harmful enough to change someones DNA.  This one is a good read:  https://www-whistleout-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.whistleout.com/CellPhones/Guides/is-5g-safe/amp

After a quick distraction, I focused on searching for articles about Wi-Fi and for anything from an Oncologist perspective.  Not all doctors get everything right but at least it's a perspective to ponder:  https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/05/19/a-radiation-oncologist-says-everything-you-need-to-hear-about-wifi-and-cancer-risk/
These articles didn't quite get the job done, so I knew the only official statement would come from a governing agency in the US and that's the FCC and possibly the CDC but I came up short there.  Here's what I found from the FCC:  https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/wireless-devices-and-health-concerns

Here are the governing bodies over Wi-Fi:



  • FCC mandates all radio transmissions in the US ( https://www.fcc.gov/ )
  • IEEE established the 802.11 Wi-Fi standard ( https://www.ieee.org/ )
  • Wi-Fi Alliance certifies access points to ensure they adhere to the IEEE standards ( https://www.wi-fi.org/ )

  • I hope this helps someone else in the quest to determine if Wi-Fi is about to kill us all.


    OPINION ALERT!  Radio waves have been bouncing around for over a hundred years and the media hasn't protested the evil radio stations, TV studios, Cell phone companies, etc.  The interwebs don't lie:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_wave

    Okay, okay the internet lies but think about this.

    Wi-Fi Radio Frequency for 2.4GHz is in the same spectrum as Microwaves.  That's a scary thought.  The very thing that cooks our food can carry modulated signals that transmit data from one device to another.

    Look at the chart below.  1 Watt is the max transmit from a radio in the US.  Microwaves cook food between 600 and 1200+ Watts.  That's 1200 times more than the highest transmit power of a Wi-Fi radio.  If you look at the green highlighted areas we are bombarded with waves at .00000001mW to .0001mW.  That's significantly lower than harmful radiation.


    DBM and MW Conversion table

    Feel free to contribute to the topic in the comments below.

    Thanks for reading.
    -Mike

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