Parents For Safe Technology

Wireless Radiation
Not a Physicist? Learn the Basics


Wireless is microwave radiation.

  • The frequency of your wifi router is about 2.45 GHz. Same as your microwave oven. 


Wireless radiation is also called radio frequency radiation or RF-EMF  Radiation.

  • RF-EMF refers to a range of frequencies from 30 kHz–300 GHz.


Wireless radiation comes from any wireless device.

  • In fact, every wireless device is a two way microwave radio. They send and receive wireless signals (microwaves). We are talking about cell phones, gaming consoles, baby monitors, bluetooth, ipads, fitbits, laptops, computers, tablets, and even wifi thermostats. 


Wireless is one of many types of electromagnetic fields (EMFs).

  • An EMF is a field of energy or charged particles. These fields are created by electronic devices. Please see the spectrum here. True, there has always been background RF radiation on our earth for centuries but this background radiation was at levels hundreds of thousands time below the radiation levels our tech devices give off. 


Wireless is a type of non-ionizing radiation.

  • An example of ionizing radiation is a nuclear bomb radiation or x-rays. Ionizing radiation immediately impacts the molecular structure by liberating electrons thereby ionizing them. Non-ionizing radiation is different . It does not immediately impact the electrons in the atoms like a nuclear bomb. Many people will argue that wireless is not harmful because it is non-ionizing and  is too weak to have molecular impacts. This is inaccurate. Non- thermal effects such as calcium ion efflux has long been noted in the research for example. 


Thermal effects means heating effects. 

  • It has been thought that non-ionizing radiation was only harmful at very high intensities because at high power it cooks and burns tissue- a thermal (heating) effect. A microwave cooking food does so via  a thermal effect. The effect is you have hot food. The mechanism or way this occurred is that the radiation was at such a high power that it caused the water molecules in the food to vibrate and generate heat .



Non-thermal effects means effects that do not have to with heating.

  • These are effects that occur at very low microwave levels of radiation  (thousands of times lower than a microwave oven) such as the power from a cell phone or WiFi router. An example of a non-thermal effect would be cancer from 10 + years of cell phone use, damaged neurons in the brains of wireless exposed mice , poor sleep or sperm damage.


The US Agency supposedly in charge of protecting people from harm from from wireless is the FCC.


  • The FCC is the Federal Communications Commission. Please note that the FCC is not a health and safety organization and does not have medical experts on staff. 


The FCC is not doing such a great job. Learn more about FCC wireless regulations.