European Regulators Increase Oversight of Apple Over iPhone 12 Radiation Worries
PARIS: Belgium said on Thursday it was reviewing potential health risks associated with Apple’s iPhone 12, raising the prospect that more European countries may ban the model after France ordered a halt to sales for violating radiation exposure limits.
Apple disputes the French findings, saying that the iPhone 12 – now a relatively old model launched in 2020 – has been certified by several international bodies as meeting radiation standards.
Researchers have conducted an enormous amount of research over the past two decades to assess the health risks of cell phones. According to the World Health Organization, their use has not been found to cause harmful health effects.
But Paris’ decision to halt sales of the iPhone 12 until Apple fixes radiation problems found in two tests has raised the possibility of further bans in Europe – although others, such as Italy, said they would not take action for now.
“It is my duty to ensure that all citizens are safe,” Mathieu Michel, Belgium’s secretary of state for digitization, said in an emailed statement to Reuters.
“I have quickly contacted the IBPT-BIPT (regulatory authority) to request an analysis of the potential danger of the product,” Michel said, adding that he had also asked the watchdog to check all Apple smartphones and devices from other producers at a later stage.
Germany’s network regulator BNetzA reiterated that the work being done in France could serve as a guide for Europe as a whole and that it would look into the matter for the German market if the process in France had progressed sufficiently.
The Dutch digital watchdog also said it was investigating the matter and seeking an explanation from the US company, but stressed there was “no acute security risk”.
Italy’s Ministry of Industry, meanwhile, said it was monitoring the situation but not taking action for now.
TRACKING
Great Britain, where the iPhone 12 met radiation safety standards at the time of release, has not announced any plans since the French decision.
In Spain, the consumer organizations OCU urged the authorities to follow the French measure and stop selling the iPhone 12.
Industry experts said there were no safety risks because legal limits based on the risk of burns or heatstroke from phone radiation were set well below the levels at which researchers have found evidence of harm.
Apple does not break down its sales by country or model.
The company launched the iPhone 15 on Tuesday, and the three-year-old iPhone 12 cannot be purchased from Apple’s online store in France and other European countries. However, it can be purchased from third parties, including Amazon France.
“Restricting sales of the iPhone 12 in itself should not be that impactful for the iPhone. We would be more concerned if there were newer models involved,” DA Davidson analyst Tom Forte noted at the same time that Apple could face bigger problems elsewhere, such as possible restrictions on the use of iPhones in China and new data regulations in Europe.
Apple’s turnover in Europe last year was about 95 billion dollars, which makes the region the second largest after America. According to some estimates, it sold more than 50 million iPhones in Europe last year.
(Additional reporting by Riham Alkousaa and Hakan Ersen in Berlin, Giuseppe Fonte in Rome, Silvia Aloisi in Milan; Writing by Tassilo Hummel and Ingrid Melander; Editing by Mark Potter)
