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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

#971

Post by cryptonector »

gojomo wrote: post #424

And you thought "Key Escrow" or "Chat Control" was bad! Future maximum-security states may just require every mobile phone to have an explosive charge pre-installed, with the detonation-codes only available to the authorities, of course. Then when they detect a device in active use by a [terrorist|child-pornographer|subversive|tax-evader], ka-blewie! Problem solved at the press of a button. See also: 'Black Mirror' s…

Stanislav Lem wrote a short story about a tyrant that made his subjects wear highly enriched uranium earmuffs so that if more than two of them got together they would assemble a critical mass.

https://culture.pl/en/work/uranium-ears-stanislaw-lem

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#972

Post by ksaj »

yonran wrote: post #683
ksaj wrote: post #540

The reason you are asked to prove your laptop can boot at airport security is that batteries and bombs have similar densities. It would be pretty straight forward to rig a pager to run off of one battery while the other is an explosive charge made to look like the actual battery.

So how do you think that airport security will adjust to the widespread knowledge that you can hide an explosive alongside the battery?

Especially now that it is abundantly clear that a pager's batteries are large enough to be replaced by quite an effective bomb. And cell phones are a fair amount larger than pagers.

It seems the pager bombs only killed the users. But they also harmed a lot of people around them.

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#973

Post by cryptonector »

guerrilla wrote: post #428
gojomo wrote: post #424

And you thought "Key Escrow" or "Chat Control" was bad! Future maximum-security states may just require every mobile phone to have an explosive charge pre-installed, with the detonation-codes only available to the authorities, of course. Then when they detect a device in active use by a [terrorist|child-pornographer|subversive|tax-evader], ka-blewie! Problem solved at the press of a button. See also: 'Black Mirror' s…

I have a better idea. Every politician has a bomb collar tied to their approval rating. ;)

Italo Calvino wrote a short story about politicians having to sacrifice parts of their bodies in order to hold positions of power, like you'd have to have a hand chopped off to serve one term, a leg to serve another, and so on.

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#975

Post by delichon »

achow wrote: post #835

Israel's Mossad spy agency planted a small amount (3 gm) of explosives inside 5,000 pagers made by Gold Apollo (a Taiwanese company). "The Mossad injected a board inside of the device that has explosive material that receives a code." 3,000 of the pagers exploded when a coded message was sent to them. Gold Apollo founder Hsu Ching-Kuang said the pagers used in the explosion were made by a company in Europe that had t…

If such a supply chain attack was in progress on a larger scale against the US, do we have mechanisms in place to detect it? Would shipments of these same devices pass through US customs?

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#977

Post by ben7799 »

ksaj wrote: post #540

The reason you are asked to prove your laptop can boot at airport security is that batteries and bombs have similar densities. It would be pretty straight forward to rig a pager to run off of one battery while the other is an explosive charge made to look like the actual battery.

They have other ways to detect explosives.

I've had my stuff tested for explosives, and it did not involve turning anything on.

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#978

Post by Maken »

fsckboy wrote: post #723

I'm getting tired of everybody saying "supply chain, supply chain": first, you have no information. second, it's so non-specific, it's less informative than "they inserted exploding batteries into the supply chain" vs "a container that was unloaded was not actually from the source" which I would say isn't even supply chain, like if I leave a box of dog poop at your door, I haven't tampered with your "supply chain" ma…

>second, it's so non-specific, it's less informative than "they inserted exploding batteries into the supply chain" vs "a container that was unloaded was not actually from the source" which I would say isn't even supply chain, like if I leave a box of dog poop at your door, I haven't tampered with your "supply chain"

Almost all of the global commerce happens by contained carried by ship or plane. That someone can take a container full of electronics, tamper with them, and sell them without even the manufacturer noticing has very serious implications. Your phone and your laptop were also inside of a container, and were also handled by dozens of middleman companies. have you ever opened them and check every component? Can you assert you are not carrying a timed bomb in your pocket?

Re: Hezbollah pager explosions kill several people in Lebanon

#980

Post by carapace »

carapace wrote: post #460
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…

> I can't help but wonder about its long-term consequences. War is over. The long-term consequences are that we use our words instead of exothermic reactions to reach livable compromises.

What? You guys like war?

Seriously though. Dynamite didn't do it, nuclear bombs didn't do it, but tiny precision bombs are going to work: just kill all the people who like to fight. QED

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