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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

#411
post #358
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…

If it's basically a remotely controlled IED via a public communication network, then there's nothing technically interesting about that, really. But the aspect of some supposedly civilized state staging a mass terror attack via a remotely controlled IEDs, putting suddenly thousands of people, many of them civilians (yes, Hezballah are also civilians, because they're a major political party in Lebanon) into hospital,…

No, a mass terror attack would indiscriminately target victims. This is almost entirely opposite -- an organization widely recognized as a terrorist group (1) is narrowly targeted.

(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_designated_terrorist_g...

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#414
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…

I wonder what Israel did to ensure that only legitimate targets were harmed by the sabotaged pagers.

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Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#415
So, if the method was to substitute the batteries for ones containing explosives, then how were they triggered simultaneously?

Wouldn't this also require some additional HW/SW in the pagers to trigger the devices? Otherwise, if it was just battery terminals connecting to the battery, how would a remote signal trigger them?

Or maybe it's as simple as the adulterated batteries containing timers and thus not needing external triggering?

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#418

Seems like a harbrining of war, if the pager network was compromised, thus burns the compromised network and also harms a lot of people. Most major newspapers in Israel are saying that Netanyahu wants an invasion of Southern Lebanon: https://www.ynetnews.com/article/bje3pjv60 https://www.jpost.com/arab-israeli-conflict/article-820399 https://www.timesofisrael.com/top-general-said-pushing-for-g...

Lebanon has been shooting rockets at Israel for a while now. They already are at war. It's just Israel is very strategic about its steps.

> Lebanon has been shooting rockets at Israel for a while now.

Correction: Israel and Lebanon have been firing across the border for a while. More Israeli attacks on Lebanon than the other way around and more Lebanese dead too.

Details:

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/6/27/mapping-7400-cross-...

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/bfa9/live/320f24...

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cv2gj544x65o

And lots more details here:

"Between 21 October 2023 and 20 February 2024 the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) recorded an estimated 7,948 incidents of artillery fire from the south of the Blue Line (from Israel to Lebanon) and 978 incidents of artillery fire from the north side (from Lebanon to Israel)."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel–Hezbollah_conflict_(202...

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#419

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…

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