The discovery was made by the US defense technology company Sempre during testing of the company’s new secure private 5G and edge solution.
During the testing, done in collaboration with Jaxon Engineering, Sempre found that certain commercial-off-the-shelf smartphones were able to resist an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) that can be caused by the detonation of a nuclear device.
Among the models used in the test were the Apple iPhone 12 and the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G.
"We know how to keep telecommunication survivable now," said Sempre CEO Robert Spalding, a retired US army general and nuclear operations expert. "We've been using half the solution every day without realizing it; there's clearly no need to build a new smartphone."
According to Sempre, the latest discovery was made in Colorado Springs, Colorado, by Jaxon Engineering, a specialist in EMP shielding for the US military.
Jaxon were carrying out tests on Sempre’s military-grade data centers. The Apple iPhone 12 was tested using iOS 14.7.1, while the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G had the Android 11 operating system.
"We've seen some parts of the U.S. government take steps to secure critical communications infrastructure, but we need our domestic commercial infrastructure to show the same military-grade resiliency," said Scott White, CEO of Jaxon Engineering. "We intend to continue testing to get a better understanding of what is and isn't possible for these mobile phones in the most extreme conditions."