On Friday, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski sent an email to this four fellow commissioners requesting that the FCC revisit the rules that determine radiation exposure levels in cellphones. Three of the five commissioners have to approve his request before the FCC formally begins discussing cell phone emissions and brain tumors, but the e-mail alone is enough to stir up controversy.

The FCC hardly wants to stir the pot on this: "Our action today is a routine review of our standards," FCC spokesperson Tammy Sun told Bloomberg. "We are confident that, as set, the emissions guidelines for devices pose no risks to consumers." The question, it seems, is if existing limits are sufficient, particularly with regards to children, who are increasingly becoming carriers of cell phones themselves.

The FCC last visited its wireless emissions standards in 1996, setting limits for "electric and magnetic field strength and power density for transmitters operating at frequencies from 300 kHz to 100 GHz," as well as localized absorption from portable devices (cellphones and hearing aids and the like). The rules were based on the findings of the EPA, the FDA, "and other federal health and safety agencies."

"The corresponding limits for devices operated in uncontrolled environments are 0.08 W/kg for whole-body average exposure and 1.6 W/kg for spatial peak SAR [Specific Absorption Rate]," the FCC determined in 1996. For reference, an iPhone 3G reaches, "a maximum SAR of 1.39 W/kg when held at the ear," said a 2009 report from Wired.

But over the past two decades much has been made of cancer risk in cell phones and other wireless devices. A Canadian University cited health concerns when it stopped adding WiFi access points in 2006. People claim cellphone and tech allergies. San Francisco has a law requiring cell phones manufacturers to identify the specific absorption rate that a human body would receive from each device.

Still, despite government agencies and politicians posturing for new rules and regulations, there's been little scientific evidence that cell phone radiation is causing cancer or other abnormalities in humans. Yet in May 2011, the Council of Europe and the World Health Organization listed cell phones as possible carcinogens.

In 2011, Ars Science Editor John Timmer wrote that studies looking at the risks involved with cellphone radiation have largely failed to give definitive answers because, "almost all of them have significant methodological limitations, as they rely on things like self-reported usage patterns, which are often unreliable." He goes on to write:

If the epidemiology is mixed, the biology isn't. There's no well-described mechanism by which non-ionizing radiation can induce long-term biological changes, although it can cause short-term heating of tissues. Given the absence of a mechanism and the ambiguous population studies, there is no clear evidence of a long-term health risk to cellular phones.

The National Cancer Institute still maintains that no irrefutable evidence supports the idea that non-ionizing radiation can cause cancer.

Of course, there's money involved too. If the FCC does want to revisit its 1996 rules, the commission could face a lot of lobbying from overseas handset makers. "Any changes in the rules will have an impact on handset vendors," said CW Cheung, the Asia-Pacific head of consulting for telecoms at Ovum, told Bloomberg. "As most vendors are based outside the U.S., it could also become a trade issue."

While independent studies since 1996 have been inconclusive, perhaps it's not a bad idea for the FCC to revisit an almost 16-year-old set of rules, simply because they've become dated. In the '90s the FCC wrote, "We will apply the MPE [Maximum Peak Exposure] limits we are adopting to certain mobile and unlicensed devices that, although not normally used within the immediate vicinity of the body, can use higher power and may be relatively close to the body of the user and to nearby persons. Examples of the latter are cellular 'bag phones.'” Considering almost no one owns a bag-phone these days, an update to the vernacular might not be such a bad idea.