Believe it or not, you can now buy Faraday cages for your wifi router . The latest absurd conspiracy theory is that wifi routers are sending dangerous 5G radiation through your home. The cages promise to block the radiation. But buyer beware, those that have bought the cages have noticed that their wifi doesn’t seem to work as well after. Shocking… Let’s break down this conspiracy theory. Spoiler alert, you DO NOT need a Faraday cage for your wifi router!
First, what is a Faraday cage?
Faraday cages are cages made out of conductive materials. They act as a shield and block/contain electromagnetic radiation. For example, your microwave has a Faraday cage. You may have noticed that the window is not clear; there is a mesh embedded in the glass. That mesh stops the microwaves from leaving the unit. The router Faraday cages for sale are of varying quality, but this means if you buy a good one, your wifi will not be able to leave the cage.
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Not surprisingly, the router cages are interfering with people’s wifi.
One Amazon review rated their cage one-star because it disrupted their wifi:
“I would be returning this item as the wifi signal is not strong enough to reach my room when the lid is closed”.
But not all of the Faraday cages are built well. One person, who presumably did know what they were buying, gave their cage a one-star review because it didn’t work:
“We tried this cage. It does not reduce the signal at all on either of my routers. Returned it […]”
Okay, so the cages are blocking the signal; are they blocking 5G waves?
If you could live without wifi and use a cord to connect to the internet, would these cages be a good purchase then? Not if you want to block 5G. Wifi and 5G are not the same things. Your wifi router emits frequencies between 2.4 to 5 GHz. 5G operates on much higher frequencies , around 30 GHz. These higher frequencies are emitted from cell phone towers, not wifi routers.
Is 5G dangerous?
No. There are parts of the spectrum that are dangerous, but these are much higher frequencies — like x-rays. The only known side-effect from 5G is heat. If you are exposed to high doses of frequencies in the range of 5G the temperature in the exposed area will get hot.
We live in a scary time.
There is so much new technology and not all of it is good. The fear around 5G likely is just tapping into this justifiable fear. It is easy to write off those buying Faraday cages for their routers as crazy, but it is not that simple. We all have information overload and are all just trying to do the right thing. We need more open discussion about technology and less trolling.
h/t: Gizmodo
