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Coronavirus: Scientists brand 5G claims 'complete rubbish':
Conspiracy theories claiming 5G technology helps transmit coronavirus have been condemned by the scientific community.
Videos have been shared on social media showing mobile phone masts on fire in Birmingham and Merseyside - along with the claims.
The UK's mobile networks have reported 20 cases of masts being targeted in suspected arson attacks over the Easter weekend, including damage to a mast providing mobile connectivity to Birmingham's Nightingale Hospital.
The posts have been shared on Facebook, YouTube and Instagram - including by verified accounts with hundreds of thousands of followers.
TV regulator Ofcom is assessing comments made by presenter Eamonn Holmes in which he cast doubts on media outlets for their attempts to debunk the claims.
But scientists say the idea of a connection between Covid-19 and 5G is "complete rubbish" and biologically impossible.
The conspiracy theories have been branded "the worst kind of fake news" by NHS England Medical Director Stephen Powis.
[...] Many of those sharing the post are pushing a conspiracy theory falsely claiming that 5G - which is used in mobile phone networks and relies on signals carried by radio waves - is somehow responsible for coronavirus.
Tough sledding for the engineers, but concerns about 5G have been raised prior to the coronavirus.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday April 25 2020, @03:02PM
How long should it take? It was first released [ftc.gov] in May 1995. A German magazine [wikipedia.org] finally took a look at it in December and determined that it was worse than doing nothing. The FTC had been investigating it over a similar time frame, and the product was removed from sales by the middle of next year. That's pretty fast even for an overt fraud.
The key thing to remember here is perception. The idiot hears about this memory problem, picks up a box that confidently says it fixes the problem, and thinks the matter is settled - placebo effect in action. But when are knowledgeable people going to get exposed to it? The key to a good fraud is controlling information, particularly, the mark's perception. But it also means excluding knowledgeable people who will see through the con quickly, and people who can bring down serious negative consequences on the fraudster, particularly, law enforcement. My suspicion is that if you look at advertising for the SoftRAM product, it was in venues where idiots tended to congregate and knowledgeable people stayed away. Thus, it can take a surprising amount of time (well in excess of a year) to go from fraudulent product to regulatory crackdown.
It's one of the reasons I like to browse with ads enabled. It gets me an idea of how stupid the reader is expected to be.