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Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

reuters.com

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Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#381

Post by moduspol »

hhh wrote: post #188
netsharc wrote: post #39

It must be a combination of hardware (put a bomb in it) and software (trigger an explosion when a particular command is received) hack. Triggering an explosion of all devices is needed because if people started hearing about exploding pagers, they'd place their own far away from anything precious to them. Geez, I thought this kind of hack is the stuff of (bad) action movies. I wonder if there's a pager that was power…

They’re pagers, so it could also be a modification of the firmware to listen for a certain message (could it be as simple as a pocsag network where all of the pagers would get every message and only alert if it’s targeted for them?)

Cheap cell phones have been used as detonators for quite some time.

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#382

Post by AustinDev »

barbazoo wrote: post #354
einszwei wrote: post #196

From Israel's perspective, this supply chain attack was undoubtedly a clever move, but I can't help but wonder about its long-term consequences. Although it was aimed at harming Israel's adversaries, third-party countries may now hesitate to involve Israel in their supply chains. There's also the risk that other major producers could replicate this tactic, potentially leading to further escalation in the region or be…

> From Israel's perspective, this supply chain attack was undoubtedly a clever move From The Guardian [1]: > Eight killed and 2,750 wounded Was that a clever move if you're killing "only" 8 potential adversaries? [1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2024/sep/17/middle-ea...

The death toll isn't the goal. They're after the 2nd order effects, now there are ~3,000 operatives that are marked by a scar that is relatively distinctive. They also have substantially disrupted their communication protocols and caused psychological damage.

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#383

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

elteto wrote: post #361

This almost reads like science fiction, what an incredible attack from a technical POV. A couple of thoughts: 1. The beepers were compromised and have been for a long time. I don't know how easy it is to exfiltrate data from them if they are receive-only devices. At any rate it shows that Israel is capable of intercepting and manipulating low-tech comms. What's left for Hezbollah to use? 2. The next step is to hack i…

> 1. The beepers were compromised and have been for a long time.

Where did you see this? Sources are saying that Hezbollah recently upgraded their pagers with the American University of Beirut on August 29:

https://x.com/gazanotice/status/1836082218805891360

Why would Israel have the ability to wipe out a good chunk of Hezbollah for years and just sat on it until now?

They are claiming 2750 injuries:

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/9/17/dozens-of-hezbollah...

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#385

Post by markus_zhang »

sbeam wrote: post #179

If we try to do what we are best at here at HN, let’s focus the discussion on the technical aspects of it. It immediately reminded me of Stuxnet, which also from a technical perspective was quite interesting. I already wonder if this was anything that was planted in the devices perviously, or if the ones responsible had similar devices, and managed reverse engineer them and craft a payload to them, that could be sent…

My hunch is that IL intelligence bought some 3,000 - 4,000 pagers of the same models, fixed them with explosives and trigger systems, and swapped them with the package sent to Hez in the middle of transport or (probably) in the Lebanon distribution center.

So they needed to know: which company manufactured those pagers; which models are sent to Hez; when they were in transport and arrived at the distribution center; which packages went to Hez operatives, and much more information.

BTW rumors says the pagers were manufactured by a Taiwanese company, not confirmed though but some of my friends were able to read from the pictures that show what was left of the pagers.

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#386

Post by meindnoch »

Reminds me of two things:

1. Mossad killed the chief bombmaker of Hamas with an exploding phone in 1996: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahya_Ayyash

2. My grandma used to say not to wear my phone on me, especially close to my heart or my balls, because she thought it was dangerous somehow. Turns out she was right!

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#388

Post by dmvdoug »

mmastrac wrote: post #365

That's an impressive supply-chain hack. Spend years showing how insecure modern telecom devices are and scare your enemy into going old-school, receive-only. Set up a shell company to sell pagers to your enemy's shell company. Give them devices implanted with a small explosive charge pointed inward, knowing they will be worn around the waist most of the time. Hack the backend server, send a coordinated page to all th…

Just Mossad Mossadin’.

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#390

Post by uoaei »

sbeam wrote: post #179

If we try to do what we are best at here at HN, let’s focus the discussion on the technical aspects of it. It immediately reminded me of Stuxnet, which also from a technical perspective was quite interesting. I already wonder if this was anything that was planted in the devices perviously, or if the ones responsible had similar devices, and managed reverse engineer them and craft a payload to them, that could be sent…

There is no way an unaltered pager has enough potential to explode in any way that could be harmful using a software-based exploit. Unless somehow the BMS (even if there was one) allowed you to short the battery with software, which seems really stupid to design into such a system.
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