Safe ICT NZ

Craig wrote last week about his experience at the Auckland Go Green Expo, and I also mentioned that myself and Bronwyn, along with Daniel Ryan, attended the Wellington Go Green Expo a couple of weeks ago. As I mentioned briefly on last week's podcast episode, apart from the frustration of the fact that the vast majority of stalls have nothing to do with going green, one particular stall annoyed me more than any other.

That stall was the Safe Information and Communications Technology for New Zealand (Safe ICT NZ) stall, and despite its name it sadly wasn't pushing for awareness of online scams, or good advice on what to do if your computer becomes infected with a virus. Instead it was pushing fearmongering of technology, telling people that wireless technologies like Bluetooth, WiFi and 5G could cause cancer, and advising people to limit their screen time and turn off their devices when not being actively used.

As a tech geek and IT professional, this kind of nonsense really irked me. I was a little taken aback by just how unhappy I was watching the two people manning the stall try to convince passersby to not carry their phone in their pocket and to turn off their home WiFi at night. I guess this must have, at least in part, come from my passion for technology. It felt that by demonising these useful tools that are a part of the fabric of our modern world, these people were trying to restrict people's access to the knowledge and convenience we all deserve. Another part of my ire probably came from both my skepticism and my understanding of how technology works - so much of what was being said was obviously false, although to a layperson I could see it being believable.

As I engaged with these people, and chatted with them, they invited me to take some stickers (and place one on my car), and to commit to at least one of the pledges they had written down on a large board. I chose the pledge to “look up Safe ICT NZ's website”, which I have done, and I've not been impressed with what I read. Here are the stickers, and a photo of my pledge (my name is on the pink post-it note):

I was asked to fill in a quiz to enter a prize draw. In reality this quiz was a thinly veiled attempt to push a set of beliefs about technology on people, with all of the questions having an answer that was very obviously the one they were looking for people to tick.

What I'm going to attempt now is a speedrun of countering their false claims. I'll write down each question, along with the potential answers, quickly look up the facts, and see if we can bust their misinformation as quickly as possible. I'm starting at 12:55am, and my time will include the time it takes to type in the questions. Here we go:

  1. What is the most common password on the Internet?
  2. 123456
  3. 123456789
  4. password

Okay, this first question is actually okay, and hopefully reminds people to use strong passwords. The answer appears likely to be 123456.

  1. Blue light is emitted by computer/phone screens, televisions and blue LED lighting. Is it a problem?
  2. Blue light at night stops the production of sleep hormone melatonin
  3. Sunlight in the middle of the day is 100,000 times brighter than a computer screen, so there isn't any problem.

This question's obviously looking for the answer 1. Despite some scaremongering online about the dangers of blue light near bedtime (often used as a way to sell a “harm reducing” product), there's no good evidence that blue light stops melatonin production - it does have some effect in suppressing it a little, but it appears unlikely that this is enough of an effect to cause people problems with sleeping.

As for the “wrong” answer, a quick google shows that phone screens vary up to about 1000 nits (candlepower per square metre) brightness, although most these days will significantly reduce their brightness at night. The sun at midday is over 1,000,000,000 (1 billion) nits, so the ratio given here is actually lower than in reality. However, obviously the midday sun isn't conducive to sleep, so this answer's a little nonsensical.

  1. What happened to bee colonies when exposed to mobile phone frequencies (900 MHz) for 10 minutes a day for 10 days?
  2. The exposed bees did not return to the hive
  3. The bees continued on as usual

A quick search found several articles about testing the effect of radio frequencies on bees. Now, I'm not an expert and I don't expect to be able to read these articles and figure out whether they're trustworthy or not, but I don't have to. Luckily other people have done the work for me, and have debunked the study from two Indian researchers that appears to be the source of this claim, as well as other studies:

  1. How far from your head do you need to keep your cell phone to keep to adsorbed radiation guidelines?
  2. 3mm from your head
  3. This varies from phone to phone, but at least 5mm - 15mm. Researchers (ANFR) have found the majority of phones tested emit radiation 3x higher than safety standards, so triple the distance on your phone's safety guidance: 1.5cm - 4.5cm.

If we assume they mean absorbed rather than adsorbed, then it appears that 3mm should be fine. There's some good information about how this is scaremongering from both our own Ministry of Health and the US National Cancer Institute:

  1. While looking at a computer screen
  2. Our blink rate halves from twelve blinks a minute down to six blinks a minute and dries our eyes.
  3. Our blink rate goes up to twenty four blinks a minute and wets our eyes

The first paper I found when searching for this suggests that neither are true, and that our blink rate when staring at a screen is pretty much the same as when we stare at, and focus on, a piece of paper. It goes on to give some reasons why previous studies may have reached different conclusions.

  1. Is BlueTooth safe?
  2. It is not very powerful so isn't dangerous.
  3. BlueTooth uses very similar frequencies (2.4 - 2.4835 GHz) to a cell phone's ones (400 MHz - 2 GHz), But because it blasts at full power all the time, the risk may be worse or equal to a cell phone's (when its BlueTooth and GPS are off).

Like other wireless technologies that our technology devices use, Bluetooth emits only low levels of non-ionising radiation, so it's considered safe to use:

  1. Is Wi-Fi safe?
  2. It is non-ionising radiation, without enough power to take an electron off an atom, so therefore it is safe.
  3. Research on animals exposed to Wi-Fi has found problems with sexual and fertility cell development, compromised immunity, cancer, and other negative health effects.

Here we go again, more mentions of “research” and yet not a single link, or study name, is given. I'm happy to concede that there likely are studies out there that claim each of the things listed in answer b., but that doesn't mean these are real effects. What we do know is that these kinds of results are implausible given what we know of non-ionising radiation.

  1. Are wireless trackers proven safe?
  2. No. There is no research proving safety. The same frequencies have been tested on chickens and proven harmful to their developing embryos, so they're unlikely to be safe for other birds either.
  3. Yes. If they weren't safe we wouldn't be using them.

The wireless trackers I assume they're talking about (AirTag, Tile, etc) basically use Bluetooth (specifically BTLE - BlueTooth Low Energy) - so see question 6 above, as these are safe to use. The devices rely on other people's devices to report your tracker when it's in range, which is a clever solution that works especially well in areas with a high population density. Eventually trackers might start using something that doesn't rely on other people's phones to find your device, like LoRaWAN, but that could only happen once there's a comprehensive, accessible national network available.

  1. How far away should you keep your phone from a pacemaker to be safe?
  2. More than 3cm.
  3. More than 15cm and more than 30cm while charging.

From what I can find online, the risk to pacemakers from a mobile phone is very low, and newer generation networks (3G, 4G and beyond) tend towards being lower power than their predecessors, so modern phones are even less risky than older ones. But, for anyone who wants to be cautious, here are some decent guidelines:

https://www.fda.gov/radiation-emitting-products/cell-phones/potential-cell-phone-interference-pacemakers-and-other-medical-devices

  1. When filming for Google maps did Google also collect wireless data, including complete email messages, in New Zealand?
  2. Yes.
  3. No.

And we finish off on another accurate question/answer. Yes, Google messed up and ended up storing data from some unencrypted WiFi access points as its Google Street View cars were driving around New Zealand. Google was using their cars to scan WiFi access points and record their SSIDs (the names of the wireless networks), with the plan being to use them to allow people's phones to figure out someone's approximate location even if they couldn't get a useful GPS signal, or didn't have GPS in their device. But an engineer ended up adding code to capture data if it was being sent openly, without any encryption. Here's what New Zealand's Privacy Commissioner had to say about the debacle:

https://www.privacy.org.nz/publications/commissioner-inquiries/google-s-collection-of-wifi-information-during-street-view-filming/

Okay, stop the clock. It's now 2:15am - so it took just over an hour to show that most of the expected answers are just flat out wrong. Here's the reverse of the quiz sheet, which it turns out has all of their expected answers:

In looking into these questions I learned a little more about technology, which is cool, but I also saw many reputable sites saying the same thing: The technology we use today isn't using any electromagnetic frequencies that are likely to be affecting our physical health. In fact, the real danger to physical health from devices like mobile phones doesn't come from their “radiation”, it comes from human stupidity - in this case people using their devices while driving, and becoming a danger on the road to others.