Article Israeli technology

[C C]

RELATED POST (scivillage): Mind Boggling News is coming out of Lebanon today!

Hopefully the cause wasn't the last possibility below. Better it had been a bulk deal with a new provider that was so discount it could not be turned down.
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Hezbollah hit by a wave of exploding pagers in Lebanon and Syria. At least 9 dead, hundreds injured
https://apnews.com/article/lebanon-hezbo...aec124461b

EXCERPTS: [...]  Pagers used by hundreds of members of the militant group Hezbollah exploded near simultaneously in Lebanon and Syria on Tuesday

[...] The pagers that exploded had been newly acquired by Hezbollah after the group’s leader ordered members to stop using cell phones, warning they could be tracked by Israeli intelligence. A Hezbollah official told The Associated Press the pagers were a new brand the group had not used before.

[...] The explosions came hours after Israel’s internal security agency said it had foiled an attempt by Hezbollah to kill a former senior Israeli security official using a planted explosive device that could be remotely detonated.

[...] Lebanon’s health minister, Firas Abiad, said at least nine people were killed, including an 8-year-old girl, and 2,750 wounded — 200 of them critically — by the explosions. Most had injuries in the face, hand, or around the abdomen.

Hezbollah said in a statement that two of its members were among those killed. The Hezbollah official who spoke anonymously identified one of the dead as Mahdi Ammar, the son of one of the group’s members in the Lebanese parliament.

[...] That raises the possibility Israel was aware of a shipment of pagers heading to Hezbollah and managed to modify the pagers before delivery, he said.

Another possibility is an electronic pulse “that was sent from afar and burnt the devices and caused their explosion,” said Yehoshua Kalisky, a scientist and senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies, a Tel Aviv think tank. “It is not some random action; it was deliberate and known.”

[stryder]

RELATED ITEM (scivillage): https://www.scivillage.com/thread-14789-...l#pid66499

Hopefully the cause wasn't the last possibility below. Better it had been a bulk deal with a new provider that was so discount it could not be turned down.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Hezbollah hit by a wave of exploding pagers in Lebanon and Syria. At least 9 dead, hundreds injured
https://apnews.com/article/lebanon-hezbo...aec124461b

EXCERPT: A Hezbollah official told The Associated Press the pagers were a new brand the group had not used before.

[...] The explosions came hours after Israel’s internal security agency said it had foiled an attempt by Hezbollah to kill a former senior Israeli security official using a planted explosive device that could be remotely detonated.

[...] Lebanon’s health minister, Firas Abiad, said at least nine people were killed, including an 8-year-old girl, and 2,750 wounded — 200 of them critically — by the explosions. Most had injuries in the face, hand, or around the abdomen.

Hezbollah said in a statement that two of its members were among those killed. The Hezbollah official who spoke anonymously identified one of the dead as Mahdi Ammar, the son of one of the group’s members in the Lebanese parliament.

[...] That raises the possibility Israel was aware of a shipment of pagers heading to Hezbollah and managed to modify the pagers before delivery, he said.

Another possibility is an electronic pulse “that was sent from afar and burnt the devices and caused their explosion,” said Yehoshua Kalisky, a scientist and senior researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies, a Tel Aviv think tank. “It is not some random action; it was deliberate and known.”

It wouldn't likely be an electronic pulse as most equipment has some form of EM-shielding, that implies that it had to have a deliberate payload with a deliberate signal. It's even possible that some pagers might have been in shielded environments which means they wouldn't have gotten a signal until outside of the shielding.

Hackers for years have tinkered and worried about how to blow up powerpacks and batteries in devices, most of the time any near success usually lead to changes in the method a product would be produced. So it definitely suggest that it was down to the kit being used being inferior or purposely set up with explosive. Further to that it's also possible that the pagers might of been rigged as "Dead mans switches" incase any of them had been captured, so it's just down to someone finding a way to trigger the deadmans signal.

[Yazata]

Better it had been a bulk deal with a new provider that was so discount it could not be turned down.

Obviously I have no way of knowing, but my guess is that Hezbollah directly or indirectly purchased thousands of pagers from a manufacturer in some place (Taiwan would be my guess) that cooperates closely with the Israeli secret services. So these particular pagers were manufactured to non-standard Israeli specifications to include a little extra plastic explosive and detonator.

[Yazata]

The pagers are reported by multiple sources to have been manufactured by Gold Apollo in Taiwan.

I'll add (this is entirely speculative on my part) that it's possible that the Taiwanese pagers might have been routed through Singapore, which is widely known to have very close military technology ties with Israel, and the pagers might have been altered there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Apollo_AR924

(I'd hate to be the Gold Apollo customer service person today!)

[Zinjanthropos]

The pagers are reported by multiple sources to have been manufactured by Gold Apollo in Taiwan.

I'll add (this is entirely speculative on my part) that it's possible that the Taiwanese pagers might have been routed through Singapore, which is widely known to have very close military technology ties with Israel, and the pagers might have been altered there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Apollo_AR924

Will that spawn copycat killers? That’s all they need, new ideas and warehouses full of communication tech to sabotage.

Imagine someone booby-trapping every cell phone sold in America, they might get everybody.

Back to beating a drum or a homing pigeon.

[stryder]

The pagers are reported by multiple sources to have been manufactured by Gold Apollo in Taiwan.

I'll add (this is entirely speculative on my part) that it's possible that the Taiwanese pagers might have been routed through Singapore, which is widely known to have very close military technology ties with Israel, and the pagers might have been altered there.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Apollo_AR924

More news today reveals that the actual company now suggested to have made them is a BAC Consulting KFT in Hungary.

The Taiwanese company however has been processed by the Taiwan police in relationship to it (it was likely necessary to prove there was no wrong doing or safety concerns. The likelihood is that due to explosives being a controlled substance that none of that occured there. The concern however would likely be that it could be span that they were involved in an attack, it could embolden certain other countries into more hostile tactics if they could prove it had been the case.)

It pointing back to Hungary could generate a bit of a problem for Viktor Orbán (due to other governments agents messing with controlled materials), but it would likely be proven again that the modifications (at least the explosives) didn't occur in Hungary itself (otherwise there would be questions about controlled substances being so freely available.) The best guess is that somewhere along the shipping route the modification was made (like switching out the battery pack)

Will that spawn copycat killers? That’s all they need, new ideas and warehouses full of communication tech to sabotage.

Imagine someone booby-trapping every cell phone sold in America, they might get everybody.

Back to beating a drum or a homing pigeon.

Thats my main concern of the whole affair. It's not the who was targetted, it's the what comes next. What copycatting. I mean you just need a group to get an idea of how to use it to ransomware countries and they can squeeze for bitcoins etc.

[Zinjanthropos]

Price of electronic devices just went up now that screening them for explosives will be necessary. Also shows how vulnerable one side of a war can be without modern communications.

Figure Hamas and Hezbollah will confiscate civilian devices in order to keep fighting.

[Yazata]

More news today reveals that the actual company now suggested to have made them is a BAC Consulting KFT in Hungary.

Which I'm hearing might be a shell company owned by Israel.

Assuming that's true, Hezbollah paid Israel to blow up thousands of Hezbollah fighters! Israel made money on the deal!

If that's true, talk about adding insult to injury!