Viral: Netizens are shocked to realise what the G in 5G stands for, and it's not gigabyte

If you were living life peacefully, assuming you knew what the G in 5G, the internet you use daily is, then you are about to lose your mind for some time. It doesn't help the matter that the 'G' in every different data variation such as 3G, 4G, 5G and 10G has a different meaning with gigabyte being the one for only 10G.

Recently a post on X by MTN Uganda asked people to answer "without Googling, what does the "G" in 4G and 5G stand for?" The options for the answers were A) Generation B) Gigabyte C) Google and D) Grid

Most of the people in the comments section answered B for Gigabyte, however, the answer was A for Generation. Others went for out-of-the-box answers such as Generator, Greed, Good thief, Gamma rays and more.

What does 5G mean?

5G is the fifth generation of wireless technology. It is commonly used for smartphones and is better than the previous generations at connecting multiple devices at once.

The evolution of the G system began in 1980 with the invention of the mobile phone which allowed for analogue data to be transmitted via phone calls. In 1991, digital came into the arena with 2G and SMS and MMS capabilities were launched.

5G in particular debuted in South Korea in April 2019 and during the Covid-19 pandemic, US researchers found that the effects of radio-frequency radiation generated by ultra-fast mobile internet had a negligible health impact.

The study published in PLOS ONE was done after several 5G masts were vandalised during lockdowns following conspiracy theories that they caused COVID-19. Thus, the researchers conducted experiments using embryonic zebrafish, an organism whose 70% genes match those of humans, meaning the results of experiments on them can be confidently applied to humans.

They exposed the zebrafishes to 3.5 GHz radio frequency radiation for two days in a box made of copper. The radiation entered the box through an antenna and the copper prevented the radiation from escaping. In the results, experts found no significant impacts on mortality thus meaning that 5G is safer for humans than any other data variation.

So the next time you talk about 5G internet you know it's fifth generation and not five gigabytes.