5 Comments for What kind of light is used in barcode scanners? is this light a kind of laser which is dangerous for eyesight?

• 1. kaz l  |  July 15th, 2005 at 6:14 pm

  infra red light is used for a bar code scanning machine and yes it does damage your eye site so dont look directly into the beam

• 2. David M  |  July 15th, 2005 at 6:36 pm

  Most barcode scanners use visible light; typically red since these are the cheapest visible diode lasers.

  To be used in public, any bar code scanner would have to be of a safety classification which means it can’t cause accidental harm to the eye. In practice this means it will be either be a Class I or Class II laser that is used. Class I is intrinsically safe and can’t cause damage to the eye. Class II is more powerful, but won’t cause accidental damage because your blink response to a bright light is fast enough to prevent harm (because you can’t see infra-red, there is no blink response and so infra-red cannot be Class II ! )

  It is possible that some barcode scanners will use Class IIIR lasers. While these are more powerful, the risk of accidental eye injury is still considered low.

  If you were to deliberately stare into a Class II or Class IIIR laser you wouldn’t have a blink response, and you could cause damage to your eye. With a barcode scanner, since the beam is actually scanning rapidly, you would probably have difficulty keeping your eye steady enough to cause any damage in practice, although I wouldn’t go trying to prove that by trying it!

  If in doubt, he best thing with lasers is to remember the adage – You only look down the beam of a laser twice: once with each eye!

• 3. rhamm618  |  July 15th, 2005 at 7:31 pm

  Infared light – which is the exact same light from the ” Sparks” of an Arc Welder, and it can burn the optic nerve and lead to blindness. It is for this very reason you should not look into the light or permit the light to enter your eyes. I’d bet though most working wth these devices ( bar scanners) don’t even realize this.

• 4. dwarf  |  July 15th, 2005 at 7:51 pm

  If it is infrared, how about our home appliance remote controls.All use infrared light. And worse, camcorders use infrared to shoot video at total darkness. In fact our eye cannot see infrared.So bar code scanners use laser ray.

• 5. JREwing  |  July 15th, 2005 at 8:17 pm

  All laser, no matter what class are harmful, some more than others. If such a laser were infrarred you wouldn’t even see it.

  If you don’t experience any harm from barcode laser it’s because it is low power but most of all because it is not fixed, I mean, it is in constant move trying to get a barcode reflection.

  Level of danger depends on level of energy which is increased directly with frecuency.

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