The European Union on Monday ordered MP3 and mobile phone makers to turn down the volume on their must-have gadgets — or risk millions of teenagers going deaf.

Meglena Kuneva, who heads the European Commission's consumer protection unit, proposed new rules aimed at preventing teenagers from cranking up music volumes to dangerous levels.

She said some music players can batter eardrums as loud as the sound of an airplane taking-off from a runway and gave manufacturers two years to come up with solutions to a growing problem facing some 10 million Europeans.

As a first step, new devices would be changed to cap the sound levels as soon as buyers take them out of their wrappers — with a setting of 80 decibels (60 being normal conversation) built in as default.

"It can take years for the hearing damage to show, and then it is simply too late," Kuneva said in a statement. "These standards make small technical changes to players so that by default, normal use is safe.

"If consumers chose to over-ride the default settings they can, but there will be clear warnings so they know the risks they are taking."

AFP

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