I read the following article which started me thinking about how something like this could possibly happen. I’m not qualified in electronics, but have an interest in electronics so my knowledge is limited.
Fresh safety fears after warning issued in Australia when woman is 'hospitalised by electric shock from her phone'... Read More
Firstly the incident has been confirmed that the electric shock was not due to an Apple iPhone or mobile phone, but there is no mention as to what appliance was involved.
Giz spoke to a Ambulance NSW representative this morning who confirmed that the woman was transported to hospital for reasons that were not a result of burns or shocks related to mobile phones.... Read More
To my mind when charging an iPhone the cable carries 5V which isn’t sufficient to cause an issue. The charger however converts 240V to 5V and if somehow the 240V reached the 5V circuitry, it may be possible. I then found two sites which provided interesting information with regards to the safety of low cost chargers. Some of the low cost non-branded chargers separate the 240V from the 5V circuit with under 1mm of space (whereas 3-4mm appears to be recommended) which means they probably wouldn’t be considered safe.
The following article discusses the Apple iPhone charger and you can see there are safety features built into the design including a resistor which fuses in case of catastrophic failure, keeping the voltages separate.
Apple's diminutive inch-cube iPhone charger ... Read More
Other good charges will likely have good safety features as well, but those without branding or certification should be probably be avoided.
I particularly liked the following site because it shows a couple of chargers where the voltages are separated by less than 1 mm showing one potential problem with some low cost chargers.
USB Power Supply/charger Test... Read More
The problem I’ve found with the media is often in haste the information we receive can be quite disconcerting. If I didn’t read additional articles with regards to the Australian woman being hospitalised due to their mobile phone, I would have been concerned as to what the safety issue was and I’m sure this may have scared many people. In fact I’m probably sure there are scammers right now putting together fake hoax emails ready to send out to people suggesting they forward them to their friends due to the safety issue.
Recently, sadly, a Chinese person reportedly did get electrocuted whilst using their mobile phone, but we can only guess as to what the cause was.
Always be mindful that any device with a rechargeable battery poses a risk as does the 240V power supply. Watch out if devices get hot and certainly there is a problem if the device delivers a shock.
- Kelvin Eldridge
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