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The Dangers of the Smartphone: A Review of Literature

Group 3
Matthew Espino
Armando Martin Del Campo
Andreana Pellman
Gerardo Moreno
Oscar Segundo Torres
University of Texas at El Paso
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Abstract

Technology can be as harmful as it can be beneficial. So much has been

experienced by owners of Samsungs Galaxy Note 7 cell phone. But exploding is not

the only issue that comes from these technological devices. Sleep deprivation can also

accompany them, leading to serious effects to a persons daily life. Courses of action

are necessary to prevent future accidents for consumers. With this literary review the

team is trying to examine the causes for such cell phone issues, how harmful have they

been, how effective, in Samsung's case, was the recall process, and what tends to

happen to recall pieces of defective cell phones. To do this, aside from recollecting and

analyzing information from secondary sources, interviews were constructed to serve as

a form of primary research for the topic. Together, this information will provide a good

overview of the harms that could come to consumers surrounding this technology,

helping to the formation of plans to stop people from getting harmed by things like

exploding phones.

The Dangers of the Smartphone: A Review of Literature

Introduction:

Back in 2016 the Samsung Company suffered a massive setback to one of their

products. Their new cell phone, the Galaxy Note 7, exhibited multiple cases of catching

fire, and even exploding due battery overheating. Due to the risks towards the clients

safety a recall of the cell phone was ordered. Knowledge of this event made the

members of the team think about what other safety issues exist regarding cell phones.

With this work there is the goal of coming up with ways to help consumers avoid getting
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harmed by this type of issues. In order to do so, the following research questions were

created for data gathering that will help the team in the fulfillment of such purpose:

1. What are the causes for such cell phone based harms to the health of the

consumers?

2. Was Samsungs recall successful?

3. How critical have these issues been for consumers? Have there been cases that

go as far as involving death?

4. What happened to the recalled equipment? Was it destroyed or resold?

5. What information should people know in order to identify harmful cell phones?

Overall, cell phone equipment such as the Galaxy Note 7 can bring safety issues to the

consumers health, and so there is a need for proposals, created through methods such

as this research, to avoid this.

What are the causes for such cell phone based harms to the health of the

consumers?

There are many reasons for which a cell phone might become a harmful object to

the user, such as the batteries of the Galaxy Note 7. In this case the lithium-ion batteries

caused explosive short-circuits when the positive and negative electrodes made

contact. Normally, these two would never make contact due to the fact that they are

place in separate sections of the battery, and that there is a layer that serves as a wall
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between them. However, the wrong positioning of negative electrodes and welding

defects made contact happen. These mistakes in the production of the product heavily

affected the reputation of the company, and made them rethink the way their products

are made.

Other harms that could come to people from cell phones are sleep deprivation.

The light emitted by the object restraints the amount of melatonin, a hormone needed to

sleep. This tends to happen when the phone is put too close to the persons face during,

or slightly before sleeping time. Of course, this has negative effects on the levels of

energy a person has the next day. For example, students academic performance might

be affected by this. Rather than originating from a production or factory defect, this

issue comes from the very nature of the cell phones components.

From this information one can gather that the causes for harm coming to

consumers by cell phones are quite varied. It is hard to pinpoint at something

resembling a common ground among the causes. Rather, it seems that each issue has

its own complexities that need to be attended separately if one is trying to find solutions

or proposals to avoid them. Right now, a good first step seems to be finding the issues

cell phones might have in general, and then the ones that are specific to the company

or model owned.

Was Samsungs recall successful?

Since the first recall in back in September 2016, Samsung has expanded the

voluntary the recall on all Galaxy Note7 devices in the United States. The expanded

recall on the Note7 devices had a success percentage of 96 of the devices refunded. In
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effort to assure the safety of the consumers Samsung in collaboration with the U.S.

Consumer Product Safety Commission, the carriers, and retailers; gave the options for

consumers to return their device for a refund or exchanging their device for another

Samsung smartphone.

A website was created that has all the information needed for a

successful recall. To further eliminate consumers ability to use the mobile devices, a

software update was released that prevented the phones from charging. They also

offered additional incentives that were covered under the U.S. Note7 Refund and

Exchange Program. Once consumers refunded or exchanged their mobile devices

incentives were available based on eligibility, some of the incentives included a bill

credit from $25 to $100. The website offered contact information, links, and tabs for

frequently asked questions.

How critical have these issues been for consumers? Have there been cases that

go as far as involving death?

The Samsung Note 7 has caused many injuries globally. One of these incidents

occurred in Boca Raton, Florida. A 28 year old man was in a convenient store when

suddenly he felt a burning sensation in his leg. Seconds later he realized his phone was

overheating, as he tried to grab his phone, it exploded. It caused severe injuries and

burns all across his outer right leg. The 28 year-old was immediately sent to the nearest

hospital where he suffered acidic burns and muscle tissue damage. Although the Note 7

has caused a lot of injuries, it has failed to cause a reported death. There is only cases
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where the phone has exploded in pockets, purses, night stands, inside vehicles, etc.

The most damaging injury that has occurred was when a Note 7 exploded inside a

moving car, causing a car accident and a collision with multiple vehicles. The women in

the car was sent to the hospital where she suffered neck injuries and minor scratches.

The fire department investigated the cause of the fire and found that the Samsung

device was responsible. Samsung has suffered dozens of lawsuits due to injuries.

Within the first week, the company received over 92 reports of overheating, 55 of

property damage and 26 of personal physical damage.

What happened to the recalled equipment? Was it destroyed or resold?

In October 2016, Samsung officially discontinued the Samsung Galaxy Note 7. A

Samsung spokesperson told the media that Samsung had decided not to repair,

refurbish, or resell the phones ever again. Samsung also stated that they had begun a

process to properly dispose the phone and to recycle each component in a safely

manner. Samsung adjusted its third quarter profit estimates to account for over $2 billion

in losses a direct result of the Note 7 recall. However Samsung may be planning to

reuse old components from the Galaxy Note 7 in other units to account for the lost

profits.

According to a new report, Samsung may launch entirely new models built from

remaining, unused production line components. With a new case and design, such a

phone probably won't resemble the Note 7 anyway. The Note 7 originally had a

3,500mAh cell, but this refurbished device will have a 3,000mAh to 3,200mAh battery

inside instead. The Galaxy Note 7 was full of perfectly serviceable AMOLED display and
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main-board parts, which had nothing to do with the defect. Samsung may be eyeing up

using these components for use in a new device, especially as mainboards are the most

expensive portion of a phone. They house processor, memory, radio, and other

expensive integrated circuits on them, which the company will already have ordered in

bulk. The repackaged devices will then be sold in emerging markets such as India and

Vietnam. Whether the report is accurate or not is currently unclear (there's no specific

source cited by the article), but it is a way to use the leftover tech from the Galaxy Note

7 problem. It's unlikely Samsung will be selling the phone under the Galaxy Note 7

name though; the report suggests the company will make new cases for the phones and

just reuse the core components.

Even if Samsung has no intention of using returned Note 7 parts, theres still the

question of what to do with all of the component orders placed for the Note 7 global roll

out. Samsung will have wasted considerable time and money into its production lines to

actually put all of the parts together. Its a potentially huge write off, but one that could

be mitigated by putting these orders to use elsewhere. Its unlikely that these parts

could be used for Samsungs upcoming Galaxy S8, as orders and production plans will

be difficult to change just months before launch. Not to mention that theres an all new

processing package and different display sizes tipped for the S8.

Conclusion

In conclusion, through unfortunate engineering mishaps and chemical reactions

caused by heat and compression of the operation of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7

caused such a massive recall for the company. This caused not one, but two recalls in

fact. The companies took massive losses due to this and have tried to recover.
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Research into the reasons why this occurred have been spread throughout most news

media sites and news television broadcasts in order to notify the public of the potential

danger that consumers who bought this product could be in. Despite the dangers, there

have been reports of reusing the parts that were already produced for new devices

which makes the need for general information concerning the parts that were used

inside of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 even more pressing.

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References

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