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The History Behind the Name: Harald Bluetooth
The idea of what we call “Bluetooth” today was first introduced back in 1989.
Dr. Nils Rydbeck, who was the Chief Technology Officer at Ericsson Mobile, and inventor Dr. Johan Ullman had this revolutionary idea to develop a pair of wireless headsets. Because, well, let’s be honest, cords and wires are annoying!
It was a major undertaking, so they brought Dr. Jaap Haartsen on to the project. A mere five years later, he’d be the engineer who made the breakthrough and came out with the first protocol.
It took a few more years to perfect the technology, but finally, in 1999, they presented their first hands-free headset to the world at the Comdex computer exposition and trade show in Las Vegas. It even won the Best of Show Award!
And it was dubbed “Bluetooth,” which then begs the question, “Where does the strange name come from?”
The Bluetooth Logo
At the time, three companies—Intel, Ericsson, and Nokia—were working separately to create short-range radio technologies. Since the invention was in its early stages, they decided the best way to proceed was to create a single wireless standard.
Jim Kardach, who was working for Intel, happened to be reading a historical book about how the Viking King Harald “Bluetooth” Gormsson united Denmark and Norway. That story inspired Kardach to propose calling this single short-link device that would unite communications “Bluetooth.”
(And in case you’re wondering how the king got the nickname, legend has it that he had a rotten tooth that looked kinda blueish.)
They also paid tribute to the great Viking king when they came up with the logo. Hmm, just looks like a ‘B’ to me, right? But if you examine it a little closer (and you happen to know the Nordic alphabet), you’ll see that the logo is formed from two different symbols representing the initials of the king: $\text{H}$ and $\text{B}$ for Harald Bluetooth.
How the Technology Works
Bluetooth works a lot like Wi-Fi. It uses radio waves to send data between devices at short distances.
Wi-Fi transmits data between your router (the source) and your device.
Bluetooth transmits data directly between two devices.
Basically, if two things have a Bluetooth option, they can communicate! This “communication” is measured in Gigahertz (GHz), and for both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, it’s usually at the 2.4(GHz) frequency. That means those radio waves are moving incredibly fast—2.4 billion waves per second! That’s why when you, say, turn your Bluetooth mouse on, the cursor starts whipping around your computer screen in an instant!
Power and Range
Even though Bluetooth still works at the 2.4 GHz frequency, it mostly works at shorter distances and uses a muuch weaker signal—just 1 milliwatt of power. You know those little laser pointers your cat loves so much?
They put out 5 milliwatts, so that goes to show you how weak 1 milliwatt is.
Bluetooth doesn’t need as much power as Wi-Fi because it’s not really doing as much work. But the cool thing is that Bluetooth can connect to 8 devices at the same time without any interference from other wireless items like garage doors or baby monitors. (Wi-Fi can sometimes have issues with that.)
The Piconet and Frequency Hopping
Let’s use a real-life example: you’re listening to music from your laptop using your wireless headphones and you’re also typing with your wireless keyboard. The Bluetooth transmitters in your computer and devices use 79 different frequencies in that range.
To prevent your music from getting in the way of your keyboard, it changes frequencies 1,600 times every second! This is called frequency hopping.
When you try to connect a Bluetooth device with your phone, a sort of conversation takes place between the two of them. They present their data and agree on whether they need to exchange information or if one needs to control the other.
After this short digital dialogue ends and the two devices agree on their roles, they connect together to form a network called a “piconet.” Once their connection is established, they begin their frequency hopping to continually stay connected and avoid interference. You can even take a device with you to another room, and it’ll keep working (as long as you don’t go too far, that is!).
Bluetooth Security and Health Concerns
Bluetooth is such a huge part of our everyday lives, yet most of the time it goes unnoticed. So if you’re wondering what devices use Bluetooth nowadays, the answer is almost all of them: phones, headphones, speakers, TVs, cars, tablets—you name it!
If you could watch them all at work, it’d be quite the spectacle. Imagine seeing that “piconet” of radio frequencies swirling from all these Bluetooth devices in your home. Your wireless mouse and computer “chatting” with each other, your Bluetooth speaker having its own conversation with your phone. And the best part is that none of them so rudely intervene in the others’ conversations!
That’s not only thanks to frequency-hopping. It’s also because each device has its own unique “address” programmed by the manufacturer. So even if your wireless mouse gets a message from your TV, it’ll just automatically ignore it because they have different addresses.
Bluetooth Security Threats
ust like all wireless networking setups, there’s always the legitimate concern of sending personal data using radio waves and that data falling into the wrong hands.
When Bluetooth first came out, it was really easy for someone to access your data without your permission. But over time, this technology has become much more secure. Manufacturers are aware of the risks, so they’ve already done a lot to make devices more protected against security threats. For instance, almost all of our personal gadgets have the “trusted devices” option, which enables you to share data without permission with certain devices, while others need permission to access your information.
However, we can’t forget about spam. There’s this trend called bluejacking where a person or company can send you their electronic business card or an ad as a text message using Bluetooth. This is something that mostly happens in public places where everyone is using their phones. You can prevent it from happening to you by making your Bluetooth device non-discoverable when you’re out and about.
Bluetooth Users Health Concerns
Unfortunately, there’s not enough evidence and research done on Bluetooth to determine if it’s harmful for people or not. It’s also quite tricky because Bluetooth waves are just one part of the wireless smog that surrounds us every single day.
But perhaps this will be comforting to know: the amount of non-ionizing radiation present in Bluetooth headphones is a lot less than what’s in a typical cellphone. So if you’re worried about Bluetooth affecting your health, you should probably give up your phone first (and still, your phone isn’t a cause for alarm either!).
There are regulatory organizations, like The Federal Communication Commission, put in place to keep the public safe from being exposed to too many radio frequencies from our devices. They check that cellphone manufacturers don’t sell devices that go over the limit of how many radio frequencies the human body can absorb from one gadget. That number is called the Specific