Graphic courtesy of Pikrepo
BY MAEVE BRADY ’20
During this year’s Super Bowl, T-Mobile announced the rollout of its new 5G cellular network. The commercial claimed that “T-Mobile’s 5G works inside and out.” It’s a vague statement; the commercial mainly just told audiences that 5G exists, and that T-Mobile has it.
But what is 5G and what does it mean for the future of technology? The short answer is speed, but this has further-reaching implications than seen in T-Mobile’s advertisement.
5G is markedly faster than its 3G and 4G predecessors. It works on what is called a “millimeter wave”: a high-frequency band of the electromagnetic spectrum that transmits data quickly, but not very far. This technology could download an entire movie in seconds, but the installation of the network has some issues.
If a 4G tower serviced a large swath of Manhattan, a 5G tower would cover a single park. Because of the short transmission distance, additional cell towers would be needed in order to create an effective 5G network.
People have pushed back against the idea of new towers crowding their neighborhoods, so for now, companies like T-Mobile are focusing on a different version of 5G, which is basically a slightly faster 4G that can still cover a large distance. The main benefit of this version of 5G will be decreased latency — that is, the lag of a webpage loading or a message sending is reduced. The 4G network latency is usually a few hundred milliseconds; the goal of 5G is to get it under 10 milliseconds.
The benefits of low latency could mean much more than faster web browsing. Remote surgery, for instance, where an expert surgeon manipulates a robot thousands of miles away to carry out a procedure, could happen with negligible dangerous lag.
Self-driving cars could depend heavily on the almost instantaneous-transmission of data, through which “every car on the road [would know] everything about every other car on the road, which reduces the chances of crashing into each other to basically zero,” said Mike Murphy, an editor at Protocol, the newly launched subset of Politico that focuses on technology. Despite the sci-fi-like futures that hinge on this development, many have expressed reservations about 5G.
Along with the push back against how intrusive 5G cell towers would be, some have raised concerns surrounding their possible health detriments.
“It’s definitely a thing to consider,” Murphy said. “The issue here is that the producers of [5G] hardware are generally relying on studies produced by the CTIA.”
The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA), represents the wireless communication industry in the United States.
“Industry is always going to protect industry. They’re never going to be the harshest critic,” Murphy said. “So, until we’ve got better information from ... international bodies of scientists, it’s tough to say that this is categorically safe.”
However, Murphy predicts that the full rollout of 5G is still five to 10 years away. Even the 4G LTE network, which first came out in 2009, has only recently developed to the point where we are seeing its full effects.
“It’s a new challenge,” Murphy says, “and it’s only just starting.”