Published On: Fri, Oct 18th, 2019

Despite what alternative media says, being a victim of 5G isn’t guaranteed

Cips Clips is a YouTube media-content producer who has a theory about the fearmongering that condemns 5G communications technology as universally unsafe (see here [beware, some swearing]). He says it is propagated by controlled alternative media (the “Truther Industrial Complex”†, as he has coined it), so that corporate-media can react to it, thus bringing the issue to the attention of a much wider audience – and creating more doubt, and in those usually less-giddy demographics so that local councils are actually being pressured to prevent 5G infrastructure. The purpose, says Cips Clips (and he could be right) is to stall 5G network infrastructure so that the involvement of Chinese technology providers can be stymied while providers sanctioned by the Five Eyes countries – meaning the intelligence agencies of the US/UK/Canada/Australia/New Zealand – close a capability gap.

A cursory check confirms that, with regards 5G, the US Government has considered, and does consider itself to be behind in a race with China; regard an FT article, Huawei spat comes as China races ahead in 5G, as evidence [if the link emerges at a demand for pay-to-view, search for the title in a search engine and follow the discovered link]. The US Government, too, openly shares a concern‡ with British Military Intelligence about Chinese participation in the building of British 5G infrastructure. This fact was prominent for public appreciation in April and May of 2019, and especially when Defence Secretary, Gavin Williamson, was sacked for “leaking” details of a National Security Council meeting. At the time, FBEL interpreted the incident as being for the “discombobulation of the public” – and of course it was, because ultimately it turned up the heat under the cauldron in which the 5G talking point was stewing.

To be clear, the author does not consume the media that Cips Clips says is fearmongering about 5G, but can see clearly why it would, and thinks (based on his experience) that it would be in its nature to do so. That’s all very well, but attempting to convince people who have invested in what they see as their reliable media, intellectually and perhaps even financially, is perhaps a waste of time and effort: it is, after all, easier to fool people than to convince them that they have been fooled.  What can be done, though, is to encourage a little critical thinking and hope people make their own way to a better understanding.

As always here at FBEL, the reader is asked to appreciate some simplistically expressed pertinent physics (if they are not already understood). So we can deal with the topic, it’s helpful to think of a fire, and appreciate two features of it: 1) that it produces energy, and it can burn at different temperatures thus giving off varying amounts of energy; and 2) that an onlooker’s experience of the energy – the heat – depends on how it must travel to him (e.g. if it has a shorter distance to travel, it will feel warmer). Likewise, the British 5G network will have transmitters that generate energy at different frequencies, and the journey that that energy will take until a human is exposed to it will affect the experience of it. In this regard, the simplistic thing to do is to think about a loss of energy as it travels, so that it gets absorbed by matter (even the air), and also reflected so as to scatter it away from its intended target.

One of the major components of the 5G fearmongering that the author has casually noticed appears to be the idea that it is a directed energy weapon in disguise: that it will have the same sort of functionality as the Active Denial System that the US military may or may not be in possession of (take US claims about its capability with a pinch of salt). According to Wikipedia, this equipment produces microwaves (shorter-waved radio) at a frequency of 95 GHz. It penetrates the top layer of skin to produce the sensation of heat (it actually causes heating), with the intention being, as a crowd control device, to make the target move away from the area containing the equipment. Presumably, the concern at the heart of the “death-ray” fearmongering is that the public, going about its business and unaware that it needs to vacate an area, will ascribe feelings of discomfort to other factors than being bathed in microwaves , and ultimately not appreciate the risk to their health until they are made ill.

The problem is, however, that millimetre wave (mmWave) microwaves, which are waves at frequencies above 24 GHz (“super data layer”), are not very good at surviving in transit, especially if they have a wall or a tree to pass through. This is why one might also see fearmongering regarding the necessity for an abundance of transmitters so that the landscape is bristling with them. While there would need to be a lot of staging posts to get this particular energy over any good distance, it would make little difference to a person ensconced in a common or garden housing unit. And Cips Clips recommends a tin-foil hat arrangement, but made out of wood (a salad bowl would perhaps do the trick), for those worried about absorbing 5G radiation.

To overcome the problem of mmWaves being unfit for purpose in certain circumstances in a 5G network, a European harmonisation convention has been decided upon whereby wide area and deep indoor coverage is to be transmitted at sub-GHz frequencies, namely 700MHz (or 0.7 GHz), while the main frequency upon which 5G will work as it is launched will be the range of 1 to 6 GHz. In fact, the British 5G network is being rolled out on what is called the 3.4 GHz spectrum, presumably a limited band around the given frequency. Additionally, Ofcom has also assigned the 2.3 GHz and 700 MHz spectrums for 5G communications – and these are in the process of being bought in auctions by interested parties. It looks as if these frequencies are for the trunk and branch parts of 5G – and obviously, the frequencies being used are a long way short than that of the American military’s supposed non lethal radiation weapon.

Of course, there is an aspect of anti-5G conjecture which holds that the lowest 5G frequency which might be used to penetrate walls and get a signal into a building will be used for “voice to skull” technology. The reason for this fiendish perpetration would be for the harassment and intimidation of someone picked out for persecution – and of course, it is presented as if anyone on the receiving end of it would be an inevitable victim (even despite the salad bowl helmet defence option).

Ultimately, this stuff is in the same realm as the nuclear bomb explanation for the destruction of the World Trade Centre. While it is said to be possible to stimulate auditory effects with microwaves at frequencies as low as 0.2 GHz (and then in a range to 3 GHz), there is a clue about the truth in the opening sentence of the Wikipedia page on the subject (emphasis added): “The microwave auditory effect, also known as the microwave hearing effect or the Frey effect, consists of the human perception of audible clicks, or even speech, induced by pulsed or modulated radio frequencies.” If you are one of those people who hear the voices of ghosts on tape recorders, or see a skull in the explosion as the plane hits the World Trade Centre, or see skeletons of hippopotami on the surface of Mars, then Flipper the evil dolphin is about to make your life a living hell – that’s if the technology actually exists, and if it works on the higher frequency 5G network.

Returning to the serious criticism of 5G, it could be said that microwaves don’t have to be much beyond 3.4 GHz to be dangerous – and so this is a good moment to compare what is potentially going to be on-street 5G with the energy generated in microwave ovens, because undoubtedly fearmongering could well exploit everyday experience of rapidly warmed food where the destructive power of microwaves is clearly evident.

Microwave ovens operate at a frequency of 2.45 GHz. Of course, we note that this is a slightly lower frequency than being used for the main 5G roll out, and we are told that it would be hazardous to use a microwave oven that could operate without a front door. But will that make on-street 5G dangerous? Not necessarily, because there is huge difference in how any exposure would be happening. Simply put, microwave ovens cook food because they are metal boxes that trap all the energy produced until it is absorbed by the item being heated – all the while until the cooking is finished. Basically, microwaved food is bombarded mercilessly by a source of energy in very close proximity to it. On the street, there is no containment so that all the energy produced will hit anyone exposed to it. Danger may come if one stationed oneself close to a transmitter, with the space between it and oneself unobstructed, and did it for a long period of time. So, the thing we can say with certainty is that if wide area 5G connectivity is to be achieved by application of the lower frequencies, as it appears to be the case, then there is no general death-beam danger.

That being said, a higher frequency spectrum will be available for specific use cases. The European harmonization convention would have these at frequencies in the 24.25-27.5GHz band (commonly referred to as the 26GHz band). 5G.co.uk says that this range “will be the key enabler of future 5G services and be critical to 5G networks”, and as this “super data layer” in Britain is concerned, that

Ofcom stated that it’s looking to make 2.25GHz of spectrum between the 24.25GHz and 26.5GHz frequencies available, with this spectrum supposedly set to “support 5G indoor applications.” Details of the availability of this spectrum should be revealed during summer 2019.

The point to take here is that what is considered to be the critical part of a 5G network is the service it can provide indoors. This makes sense, given that the technology’s selling point is its ability to send data, and that this is severely curtailed at the boundaries of dwellings and other buildings. Of course, the proponents of 5G cite its uses for scenarios in industry or medical surgery, for example, when operators of machinery need instantaneous data transfer, but nevertheless, the idea of the domestic portion of the “internet of things” immediately springs to a suspicious mind. The thing to notice, though, is that the frequency of in-house 5G is still a good deal off that used by the so-called Active Denial System; but if one is worried about exposure in the home to 5G, the solution is simple: don’t have the technology in the house (or wear the salad bowl helmet).

The big indicator as to whether alternative media is merely pushing propaganda is if the possibility of simply avoiding exposure to 5G microwaves  never occurs to it – and the author would be surprised if it did, because how then would anyone watch monetized anti-5G videos on YouTube? It would be a particularly strange omission when there is an aspect of this domestic 5G layer that is right up a conspiracy-theorist’s alley, so to speak: the potential for collecting data from a householder – or spying by corporate-government. The danger to privacy through wireless invasion is a perennial concern and there is nothing unique to 5G about it. With 5G, of course, the concern for the spying is perhaps largely overshadowed by the concern for the poisoning – and maybe there is such a drama about safety to serve as a decoy for the real issue that should be exercising people.

In any case, if both the spying and the poisoning can be avoided by refusing the technology, then what is the big deal? One can imagine that the basic simplicity of the solution is why 5G fearmongering must impress upon its audience that there is a general threat, whether or not one opts out. If your alternative media is doing that, then it is fearmongering.

Because, thinking of the fire analogy and how it is a controllable tool that would be dangerous to someone getting too close it, the author obviously can’t declare that microwaves in a communications network are universally safe, but at the same time he can’t find reason to find them universally dangerous. Unfortunately, what appears to be lacking on both sides of the argument is an appeal to common sense (a sign, perhaps, of the wilful desire to whip up hysteria). For instance, just look at one particular counter-proof used by the other side which is trying to dismiss fearmongering:

According to experts on the biological effects of electromagnetic radiation, radio waves become safer at higher frequencies, not more dangerous (extremely high-frequency energies, such as X-rays, behave differently and do pose a health risk)…

At higher radio frequencies, the skin acts as a barrier, shielding the internal organs, including the brain, from exposure. Human skin blocks the even higher frequencies of sunlight.

“It doesn’t penetrate,” said Christopher Collins, a professor of radiology at New York University who studies the effect of high-frequency electromagnetic waves on humans.

What this expertise seems to have forgotten is that microwaves don’t have to penetrate very deep in order to cause a deeper reaction. The Wikipedia entry on ovens states that “2.45 GHz microwaves can only penetrate approximately 1 centimeter (0.39 in) into most foods”. It follows that big items cook internally because of conduction from the heated outer areas. So, in the name of showing that high frequency microwaves are safe, the example of skin being a preventative against damage by sunlight is not a good one. When this expert says that human skin blocks sunlight he means it absorbs it before it can penetrate further into the body. Common experience will tell us that the sun is still capable of causing a biological reaction in the skin. There must be a bare minimum of penetration or else there can be no sun-burning.

Ultimately, people with common sense know that the best way to prevent burning is to cover up in the sun – to block the radiation (but not with sun creams, the application of which is tantamount to putting cooking oil on one’s body) – but here we have an expert telling them that the higher the frequency of the radiation, the safer one is. Surely this is only inviting scorn from a 5G fearmonger, and perhaps that’s the point.

On the first occasion that FBEL dealt with 5G (during the Gavin Williamson affair), the casual assessment made was this:

The big problem with wireless telephone networks will probably remain the same as it always has been: the use of a transmitter – a phone – placed in close proximity to the head to cause warming and ultimately stimulate cancer in the brain.

It is perhaps astonishing that after 30 years of unblinking and unthinking cell-phone usage, and God-knows-what accumulative damage that has been being stored up, the dull-witted British public must suddenly get worked up about 5G. The dynamic at work has to be that the dog, newly entered into the field, is now creating a frenzy in the flock which, hitherto now, has been standing still, munching the grass where it stood.

 

†Cips Clips says that the Truther Industrial Complex is controlled by Military Intelligence, and this would explain why it won’t acknowledge media producers who are not on message. This tallies with the author’s experience, and there is an article in the works about the networking methodology to regulate authorised alternative media and control talking points. Moreover, in the future at FBEL there will be a closer examination of the medievalism and new-ageism (defining features of Freemasonry) which appears to form the political backdrop into which British alternative media would draw its audience.

‡ The author does not necessarily agree with Cips Clips as to why this concern exists, but that is a debate to be had another time.

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