Apple has recently marketed the latest generation of iPhone – the iPhone 15 series, which is described as the biggest update in the last three years. 

Another iPhone model, iPhone 12, has become a hot topic of discussion because of information about high SAR (Specific Absorption Rate), which means the rate at which energy is absorbed by the human body when exposed to a radio frequency.

French agencies have banned the sale of Apple's iPhone 12 after tests found that the smartphone’s SAR exceeded European radiation exposure limits.

The EU’s radiation exposure limit is 4W/kg for smartphones. The maximum radiation level recommended by the US’s FCC (Federal Communications Commission) is 1.6W/kg. The French national frequency agency (ANFR) pointed out that the radiation level from iPhone 12 is 5.74W/kg

Jean-Noel Barrot, French Minister for Digital Transition and Telecommunications, said in Le Parisien that iPhone 12 has a radiation level higher than the permitted level. He said Apple has two weeks to reply, or French agencies will release a decision on recalling all the iPhone 12s now in circulation.

After the news was released that Apple will update software for iPhone 12 to solve the problem, agencies under the Vietnamese Ministry of Information and Communications, including the Authority for Science and Technology, Authority for Telecommunications, and Authority for Radio Frequency worked with Apple on the issue.

An Apple representative in Vietnam said that iPhone 12s, marketed in 2020, were inspected by different international institutions and were certified as meeting global standards on radiation. 

After ANFR inspected 141 phone models, including iPhone 12, which were in circulation and compared with SAR, it stated on September 12, 2023 that iPhone 12 generated more electromagnetic waves than the permitted level.

However, the representative in Vietnam said this is the matter of the way ANFR's testing was performed. Apple is currently continuing to work with ANFR and it has provided ANFR with Apple's measurement results and a third-party independent testing laboratory to prove its compliance with the current standards.

MIC on October 10 affirmed that the agency keeps watching over the case and update the conclusions of related parties on the issue to make the decisions reasonable for the Vietnamese market.

Van Anh