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I wouldn't wish to be in the PR damage control team of Gold Apollo right now. This was a direct attack to their survival as company. Will they sue Israeli gove

I wouldn't wish to be in the PR damage control team of Gold Apollo right now. This was a direct attack to their survival as company. Will they sue Israeli government for turning their product into a bomb used to mutilate and kill people? Seems not probable. Will they sue the Hungarian company making the bombs? That would be a more realistic target. Now Hezbollah has an excuse to attack Hungary interests in the EU and the conflict could escalate. That company should be crushed and closed for good by the Hungarian law system IMO. Either you are a military grade company or you aren't. If Gold Apollo wants to keep selling pagers, better they start making all the carcasses on their products transparent from now on. With a big photo in the boxes showing how the correct product must look.

oytis 2y ago
> That company should be crushed and closed for good by the Hungarian law system IMO. Either you are a military grade company or you aren't. Were the pagers military grade? Hungarian company providing military equipment to Hezbollah would be a scandal on its own.
- steventhedev 2y ago
  Doesn't matter. Hezbollah are subject to sanctions by the EU as a designated terrorist organization. Presumably, that applies to all companies operating within the EU. Sanctions violations are very much a "do not pass go" style crime, and this looks like it was an entire batch that was delivered directly to Hezbollah.
  - hackeraccount 2y ago
    This is the right answer.
- pvaldes 2y ago
  I assume that you, as a company, need a special permit to manufacture lethal weapons or military products on EU. Either you have it, or you don't. And if you don't have and still do it, I understand that you are breaking a dozen of EU laws. The EU now needs to do something about it, and do it fast. Or to pretend that nothing happened, surrender to Israel, create a dangerous legal precedent "for the cause" and send a clear message that EU manufacture laws are a joke: "All those security filters painfully raised around EU products worth zero and can be easily jumped over". This is a really bad message for all the EU makers. A franchise of your brand also signed a contract to make your product. I assume that changing the functionality or specifications of your registered product is strictly forbidden in that contract. I bet that this move violated some laws on Taiwan also. If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo I would be fuming and furious at this moment. Israel not only pushed them into the middle of a war that is not their war, without their consent or knowledge; also destroyed the brand image and painted a target in the backs of each employee and reseller of Gold Apollo. At this moment, nothing suggests that the Taiwan based company were part of this. They should apologize, clear things, and detach themselves from this PR mess as soon as possible. I understand that from the Mossad point of view this can be a big success, but from the point of view of the companies that try to sell their legit products, this is an direct attack.
  - prepend 2y ago
    > Israel not only pushed them into the middle of a war that is not their war, without their consent or knowledge; Weren’t they already selling pagers to Hezbollah? It seems like they were already in the war as a supplier of goods to a terrorist organization. I wonder if this is why Israel made this move because the manufacturer was already breaking international sanction by supplying Hezbollah so they have little recourse. If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo, I’d be investigating why my franchisee was selling stuff to Hezbollah in the first place. But it’s beepers and only 5,000. How expensive is this at the end of the day? It’s probably the last time a company lends then brand name for a small amount.
    - mihaic 2y ago
      > Weren’t they already selling pagers to Hezbollah? I don't have info about those specific models, but this is pagers and not rockets. If someone makes an order for 5000 units I can't image you'd have an expectation to do a background check with references. It's basically like ordering 5000 units of Raspberry Pi, would you consider that a military export?
      - PepperdineG 2y ago
        Raspberry Pis ending up in Russian weapons used in Ukraine is currently an issue actually, which it's illegal to export them to Russia.
      - prepend 2y ago
        For the US, at least, I am forced to confirm that those 5000 raspberry pis aren’t going to a terrorist organization. Isn’t the EU the same way? So it’s not that it’s a military export, but that it’s a sanctioned organization (Iran and Hezbollah).
        mihaic 2y ago
        How are you realistically able to do this though? It's not like they can't order batches to some neutral-country intermediary and then ship them from there.
- RHSeeger 2y ago
  > Were the pagers military grade I don't mean to be "that guy", but "military grade" means nothing nowadays. It can mean anything from "made to exactly standards" to "made by the lowest bidder, and likely to fail the minute it's used".
  - red-iron-pine 2y ago
    "military grade means 'from the lowest bidder', but can tolerate being a dropped a few times"
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - pvaldes 2y ago
    A type of people that uses pagers all day is Physicians. Hospital staff.
  - verulito 2y ago
    Been a while since I did fmeca work but it used to mean different tolerances for the parts.
- stef25 2y ago
  Just normal pagers with 20g of high explosive inserted in to them. They found a way of remotely getting the battery to overheat with would make the thing go boom.
TiredOfLife 2y ago
[flagged]
- desdenova 2y ago
  The terrorists didn't need an excuse to put bombs in pagers. The person you were responding was talking about the Hezbollah, though.
  - dijit 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - School-Cotton 2y ago
      > Hezbollah are classified as a terror organisation by the UN That is not true. Lots of countries and organizations consider them a terrorist organization, but the UN isn’t one of them.
      - dijit 2y ago
        Ah, quite right, I mean the EU, apologies. > As of October 2020, Hezbollah or its military wing are considered terrorist organizations by at least 26 countries, as well as by the European Union and since 2017 by most member states of the Arab League, with the exception of Iraq and Lebanon, where Hezbollah is the most powerful political party.[374] > The countries that have designated Hezbollah a terrorist organization include: the Gulf Cooperation Council,[375] and their members Saudi Arabia,[376] Bahrain,[377] United Arab Emirates,[376] as well as Argentina,[378] Canada,[379] Colombia,[380] Estonia,[381] Germany,[382] Honduras,[383] Israel,[384] Kosovo,[385] Lithuania,[386] Malaysia,[387] Paraguay,[388] Serbia,[381] Slovenia,[389] United Kingdom,[390] United States,[391] and Guatemala.[392]
        School-Cotton 2y ago
        The EU doesn’t consider Hezbollah a terrorist organization either — only its military wing. Much like people who considered the Provisional IRA to be terrorists but not Sinn Féin.
_ugfj 2y ago
As it can be expected the situation is extremely murky. Hungarian press is abuzz with this, I will translate a few hard facts and leave speculation to others. I will also use English sources as appropriate. Hungarian sources are below the list, you can run them through automated translation to fact check me. * There's a small consulting company called BAC after the initials of the founder Bársony-Arcidiacono Cristiana. One of their services is https://archive.fo/kwTKA https://archive.fo/kwTKA "We develop international technology cooperation among countries for the sale of telecommunication products. This cooperation entails scaling up a business from Asia to new markets e.g. developing countries". Their home page https://archive.fo/dXtMx https://archive.fo/dXtMx lists these: Strategic Advisor for major International Organizations including Financial companies (Venture Capitals, IAEA, UNESCO, CNRS, EC, etc.). Business Developer and Savvy Analyst for Innovative/ Solutions in diverse fields (Sustainable Development (SDGs), Water, Energy, Resilience-Mitigation-Adaptation, Capacity Building, Complex Emergencies, Digitalization (AI, Blockchain, ICT) within Humanistic Economy. * The official place of business is just a business "placeholder". The woman who answered the doorbell for journalists said no one ever from BAC is there, maybe once a month a mail comes which she receives. * This house is also the registered address for a number of companies. Two companies have Russian owners. One of them is an oil wholesaler. * BAC revenue in 2023 was 210 million forints and 13 million profit. What's remarkable is how person-related expenses (payroll etc) was a mere 0.5 million forints for the entire year. Hungarian monthly minimum wage was a bit over 0.25M HUF. One million HUF is about 2820 USD. * NBC talked to the founder. According to her "I don’t make the pagers. I am just the intermediate. I think you got it wrong". https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taiwan-firm-denies-making-pagers-used-lebanon-explosions-rcna171594 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taiwan-firm-denies-making... * The founder's linkedin is still up https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristiana-b%C3%A0rsony-arcidiacono-phd/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristiana-b%C3%A0rsony-arcidiaco... Her PhD from 2006 is at https://ucl.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/fulldisplay?docid=alma990012040630204761&context=L&vid=44UCL_INST:UCL_VU2&lang=en&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&adaptor=Local%20Search%20Engine&tab=Everything&query=any,contains,Arcidiacono&offset=0 https://ucl.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/fulldisplay?do... so it seems real. https://hvg.hu/kkv/20240918_hezbollah-bac-consulting https://hvg.hu/kkv/20240918_hezbollah-bac-consulting https://archive.is/QWlXw https://archive.is/QWlXw https://telex.hu/belfold/2024/09/18/mit-lehet-tudni-a-magyar-cegrol-ami-budapesten-gyartotta-a-hezbollah-tagok-kezeben-felrobbant-csipogokat https://telex.hu/belfold/2024/09/18/mit-lehet-tudni-a-magyar... In conclusion, if I needed to speculate based on the LinkedIn page and the archived consulting page, what gives me pause: if this woman indeed exists she is one of the most talented people in all of Hungary. Seven languages, degrees in diverse fields and a PhD in physics. At the same time, I have indeed found a PhD from 2006 and her grants and scholarships from even earlier are probably not hard to verify either. I do not know what to think.
FridayoLeary 2y ago
I doubt the company exists anymore or that there's anyone left in hungary who can be held responsible. Here's what i imagine took place: step one: mossad sets up some sham manufacturing facility in Hungary or buys an existing one. Step 2: reach out to gold apollo and make a deal to produce their pagers under license. Money no object they probably offered them very good terms. Gold apollo is so pleased by the money being offered they fail to investigate the company properly. Step 3: mossad agents start production introducing lethal batteries into the design, produce several thousand units then vanish leaving apollo executives bewildered but they have the money already so they don't ask too many questions. Step 4: sell all the pagers at a great price to some hezbolla arms dealer, go home, buy some popcorn and turn on the tv. In short everyone involved have probably disappeared months ago. Also a really clever part is that they could have turned a profit on the sale meaning the operation was at least partly subsidised by hezbolla themselves.
- d1sxeyes 2y ago
  There are lots of companies with questionable practices in Hungary. One scam I am aware of is companies that are registered in the names of homeless people whose sole function is to churn out receipts that other companies buy at fractions of their face value in order to run “clean” expenses through their books and effectively launder money. Would not surprise me if this turned out to be something like that.
  - FridayoLeary 2y ago
    Its not just Hungary. There's a famous high street in London with a series of sweet shops (about 2 dozen) that are a very obvious front for a money laundering scheme. Allegedly the taliban or some other afghan crime ring). I don't know why the authorities are ignoring them but it's probably such a big can of worms that everyones afraid to open it.
    - d1sxeyes 2y ago
      Gummy worms? In all seriousness though, those “sweet shops” and “Thai massage parlours” and the like are clearly fronts for money laundering. I doubt they’re being ignored, but as you say, there’s probably some reason no one’s dealt with them yet.
AtlasBarfed 2y ago
Hezbollah and Hamas need the inherent anti Israel bias of Europe. It's the only international group with money and influence that sides with them. If they attack anything in Israel then it is a massive Israeli win. Europe only care for geopolitical games in the Mediterranean and petroleum. The Gaza conflict has shown that oil is on its way out as a top level geopolitical influence. Lol military grade. This is a guerilla fighting group getting leftover oil money from Iran. They were using pagers. Israel has been fighting for 100 years with its hands tied. With the unofficial and largely official sunni/saudi Israel alliance, only Iran cares about the freedom fighters of Gaza and Lebanon, and you can put a ten year clock on that funding once EVs start taking real chunks of transport
adityaathalyo 2y ago
> This was a direct attack to their survival as company. Will they sue Israeli government for turning their product into a bomb used to mutilate and kill people? Seems not probable. Would Toyota or any other car manufacturer sue Arabs et al. for turning their pickups into rolling suicide bombs?
- pvaldes 2y ago
  Toyota will definitely sue to death somebody --selling-- thousands of new Toyotas modified in mass to kill their drivers. If not, they would be sued massively instead, so is not something that they could just let pass. If the owner wants later to trow their Toyota over a cliff is a different problem and not Toyota's business.
onemoresoop 2y ago
> If Gold Apollo wants to keep selling pagers, better they start making all the carcasses on their products transparent from now on. With a big photo in the boxes showing how the correct product must look. I don't think that would make a difference at all, explosives could be disguised in any electronic components, being transparent wouldn't help very much. The Taiwanese company's brand is now irreparably tarnished, I think that is the cost of lending the brand name to an untrustworthy partner.
refurb 2y ago
Can a company sue you because you modified their product? Even if that modification caused harm?
- remram 2y ago
  Am intermediary can be sued just for damaging products through insufficient, they can certainly be sued for adding defects on purpose. Especially lethal defects.
  - echoangle 2y ago
    But can the manufacturer sue? Isn’t the normal way that the customer sues, because their stuff was damaged? Can the manufacturer sue me if I buy their stuff, modify it to be deadly, and sell it again? (I don’t mean “can the sue me” but “do they have any chance of winning” of course)
    - pvaldes 2y ago
      > But can the manufacturer sue? do they have any chance of winning? For Gold Apollo the dilemma here is either to sue the Israel Government (and try to survive the experience as company), or to take the piss and be sued for the families of the people mutilated by "their" product. They are in a difficult position. It depends on how deep are their pockets and what they think will do less damage to the brand. Also if it has Taiwanese government support or not (unlikely as they probably depend on Israel technology for defense); and if Taiwan companies team with them or not. If the "made in Taiwan" sector want to keep selling radios and pagers to the rest of the planet they need to assure that this can't happen again. I assume that the consequences for Israel will be indirect, limited and approved by USA, or none.
      - pvaldes 2y ago
        Update: Gold Apollo is a small company with about 30 employees. The CEO said that this was humiliating, the products were made by a distributor in Hungary and that they were ruined for that. Small chances that they could sue anybody.

oytis 2y ago

> That company should be crushed and closed for good by the Hungarian law system IMO. Either you are a military grade company or you aren't. Were the pagers military grade? Hungarian company providing military equipment to Hezbollah would be a scandal on its own.

steventhedev 2y ago
Doesn't matter. Hezbollah are subject to sanctions by the EU as a designated terrorist organization. Presumably, that applies to all companies operating within the EU. Sanctions violations are very much a "do not pass go" style crime, and this looks like it was an entire batch that was delivered directly to Hezbollah.
- hackeraccount 2y ago
  This is the right answer.
pvaldes 2y ago
I assume that you, as a company, need a special permit to manufacture lethal weapons or military products on EU. Either you have it, or you don't. And if you don't have and still do it, I understand that you are breaking a dozen of EU laws. The EU now needs to do something about it, and do it fast. Or to pretend that nothing happened, surrender to Israel, create a dangerous legal precedent "for the cause" and send a clear message that EU manufacture laws are a joke: "All those security filters painfully raised around EU products worth zero and can be easily jumped over". This is a really bad message for all the EU makers. A franchise of your brand also signed a contract to make your product. I assume that changing the functionality or specifications of your registered product is strictly forbidden in that contract. I bet that this move violated some laws on Taiwan also. If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo I would be fuming and furious at this moment. Israel not only pushed them into the middle of a war that is not their war, without their consent or knowledge; also destroyed the brand image and painted a target in the backs of each employee and reseller of Gold Apollo. At this moment, nothing suggests that the Taiwan based company were part of this. They should apologize, clear things, and detach themselves from this PR mess as soon as possible. I understand that from the Mossad point of view this can be a big success, but from the point of view of the companies that try to sell their legit products, this is an direct attack.
- prepend 2y ago
  > Israel not only pushed them into the middle of a war that is not their war, without their consent or knowledge; Weren’t they already selling pagers to Hezbollah? It seems like they were already in the war as a supplier of goods to a terrorist organization. I wonder if this is why Israel made this move because the manufacturer was already breaking international sanction by supplying Hezbollah so they have little recourse. If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo, I’d be investigating why my franchisee was selling stuff to Hezbollah in the first place. But it’s beepers and only 5,000. How expensive is this at the end of the day? It’s probably the last time a company lends then brand name for a small amount.
  - mihaic 2y ago
    > Weren’t they already selling pagers to Hezbollah? I don't have info about those specific models, but this is pagers and not rockets. If someone makes an order for 5000 units I can't image you'd have an expectation to do a background check with references. It's basically like ordering 5000 units of Raspberry Pi, would you consider that a military export?
    - PepperdineG 2y ago
      Raspberry Pis ending up in Russian weapons used in Ukraine is currently an issue actually, which it's illegal to export them to Russia.
    - prepend 2y ago
      For the US, at least, I am forced to confirm that those 5000 raspberry pis aren’t going to a terrorist organization. Isn’t the EU the same way? So it’s not that it’s a military export, but that it’s a sanctioned organization (Iran and Hezbollah).
      - mihaic 2y ago
        How are you realistically able to do this though? It's not like they can't order batches to some neutral-country intermediary and then ship them from there.
RHSeeger 2y ago
> Were the pagers military grade I don't mean to be "that guy", but "military grade" means nothing nowadays. It can mean anything from "made to exactly standards" to "made by the lowest bidder, and likely to fail the minute it's used".
- red-iron-pine 2y ago
  "military grade means 'from the lowest bidder', but can tolerate being a dropped a few times"
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- pvaldes 2y ago
  A type of people that uses pagers all day is Physicians. Hospital staff.
- verulito 2y ago
  Been a while since I did fmeca work but it used to mean different tolerances for the parts.
stef25 2y ago
Just normal pagers with 20g of high explosive inserted in to them. They found a way of remotely getting the battery to overheat with would make the thing go boom.

TiredOfLife 2y ago

[flagged]

desdenova 2y ago
The terrorists didn't need an excuse to put bombs in pagers. The person you were responding was talking about the Hezbollah, though.
- dijit 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - School-Cotton 2y ago
    > Hezbollah are classified as a terror organisation by the UN That is not true. Lots of countries and organizations consider them a terrorist organization, but the UN isn’t one of them.
    - dijit 2y ago
      Ah, quite right, I mean the EU, apologies. > As of October 2020, Hezbollah or its military wing are considered terrorist organizations by at least 26 countries, as well as by the European Union and since 2017 by most member states of the Arab League, with the exception of Iraq and Lebanon, where Hezbollah is the most powerful political party.[374] > The countries that have designated Hezbollah a terrorist organization include: the Gulf Cooperation Council,[375] and their members Saudi Arabia,[376] Bahrain,[377] United Arab Emirates,[376] as well as Argentina,[378] Canada,[379] Colombia,[380] Estonia,[381] Germany,[382] Honduras,[383] Israel,[384] Kosovo,[385] Lithuania,[386] Malaysia,[387] Paraguay,[388] Serbia,[381] Slovenia,[389] United Kingdom,[390] United States,[391] and Guatemala.[392]
      - School-Cotton 2y ago
        The EU doesn’t consider Hezbollah a terrorist organization either — only its military wing. Much like people who considered the Provisional IRA to be terrorists but not Sinn Féin.

_ugfj 2y ago

As it can be expected the situation is extremely murky. Hungarian press is abuzz with this, I will translate a few hard facts and leave speculation to others. I will also use English sources as appropriate. Hungarian sources are below the list, you can run them through automated translation to fact check me. * There's a small consulting company called BAC after the initials of the founder Bársony-Arcidiacono Cristiana. One of their services is https://archive.fo/kwTKA https://archive.fo/kwTKA "We develop international technology cooperation among countries for the sale of telecommunication products. This cooperation entails scaling up a business from Asia to new markets e.g. developing countries". Their home page https://archive.fo/dXtMx https://archive.fo/dXtMx lists these: Strategic Advisor for major International Organizations including Financial companies (Venture Capitals, IAEA, UNESCO, CNRS, EC, etc.). Business Developer and Savvy Analyst for Innovative/ Solutions in diverse fields (Sustainable Development (SDGs), Water, Energy, Resilience-Mitigation-Adaptation, Capacity Building, Complex Emergencies, Digitalization (AI, Blockchain, ICT) within Humanistic Economy. * The official place of business is just a business "placeholder". The woman who answered the doorbell for journalists said no one ever from BAC is there, maybe once a month a mail comes which she receives. * This house is also the registered address for a number of companies. Two companies have Russian owners. One of them is an oil wholesaler. * BAC revenue in 2023 was 210 million forints and 13 million profit. What's remarkable is how person-related expenses (payroll etc) was a mere 0.5 million forints for the entire year. Hungarian monthly minimum wage was a bit over 0.25M HUF. One million HUF is about 2820 USD. * NBC talked to the founder. According to her "I don’t make the pagers. I am just the intermediate. I think you got it wrong". https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taiwan-firm-denies-making-pagers-used-lebanon-explosions-rcna171594 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taiwan-firm-denies-making... * The founder's linkedin is still up https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristiana-b%C3%A0rsony-arcidiacono-phd/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristiana-b%C3%A0rsony-arcidiaco... Her PhD from 2006 is at https://ucl.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/fulldisplay?docid=alma990012040630204761&context=L&vid=44UCL_INST:UCL_VU2&lang=en&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&adaptor=Local%20Search%20Engine&tab=Everything&query=any,contains,Arcidiacono&offset=0 https://ucl.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/fulldisplay?do... so it seems real. https://hvg.hu/kkv/20240918_hezbollah-bac-consulting https://hvg.hu/kkv/20240918_hezbollah-bac-consulting https://archive.is/QWlXw https://archive.is/QWlXw https://telex.hu/belfold/2024/09/18/mit-lehet-tudni-a-magyar-cegrol-ami-budapesten-gyartotta-a-hezbollah-tagok-kezeben-felrobbant-csipogokat https://telex.hu/belfold/2024/09/18/mit-lehet-tudni-a-magyar... In conclusion, if I needed to speculate based on the LinkedIn page and the archived consulting page, what gives me pause: if this woman indeed exists she is one of the most talented people in all of Hungary. Seven languages, degrees in diverse fields and a PhD in physics. At the same time, I have indeed found a PhD from 2006 and her grants and scholarships from even earlier are probably not hard to verify either. I do not know what to think.

FridayoLeary 2y ago

I doubt the company exists anymore or that there's anyone left in hungary who can be held responsible. Here's what i imagine took place: step one: mossad sets up some sham manufacturing facility in Hungary or buys an existing one. Step 2: reach out to gold apollo and make a deal to produce their pagers under license. Money no object they probably offered them very good terms. Gold apollo is so pleased by the money being offered they fail to investigate the company properly. Step 3: mossad agents start production introducing lethal batteries into the design, produce several thousand units then vanish leaving apollo executives bewildered but they have the money already so they don't ask too many questions. Step 4: sell all the pagers at a great price to some hezbolla arms dealer, go home, buy some popcorn and turn on the tv. In short everyone involved have probably disappeared months ago. Also a really clever part is that they could have turned a profit on the sale meaning the operation was at least partly subsidised by hezbolla themselves.

d1sxeyes 2y ago
There are lots of companies with questionable practices in Hungary. One scam I am aware of is companies that are registered in the names of homeless people whose sole function is to churn out receipts that other companies buy at fractions of their face value in order to run “clean” expenses through their books and effectively launder money. Would not surprise me if this turned out to be something like that.
- FridayoLeary 2y ago
  Its not just Hungary. There's a famous high street in London with a series of sweet shops (about 2 dozen) that are a very obvious front for a money laundering scheme. Allegedly the taliban or some other afghan crime ring). I don't know why the authorities are ignoring them but it's probably such a big can of worms that everyones afraid to open it.
  - d1sxeyes 2y ago
    Gummy worms? In all seriousness though, those “sweet shops” and “Thai massage parlours” and the like are clearly fronts for money laundering. I doubt they’re being ignored, but as you say, there’s probably some reason no one’s dealt with them yet.

AtlasBarfed 2y ago

Hezbollah and Hamas need the inherent anti Israel bias of Europe. It's the only international group with money and influence that sides with them. If they attack anything in Israel then it is a massive Israeli win. Europe only care for geopolitical games in the Mediterranean and petroleum. The Gaza conflict has shown that oil is on its way out as a top level geopolitical influence. Lol military grade. This is a guerilla fighting group getting leftover oil money from Iran. They were using pagers. Israel has been fighting for 100 years with its hands tied. With the unofficial and largely official sunni/saudi Israel alliance, only Iran cares about the freedom fighters of Gaza and Lebanon, and you can put a ten year clock on that funding once EVs start taking real chunks of transport

adityaathalyo 2y ago

> This was a direct attack to their survival as company. Will they sue Israeli government for turning their product into a bomb used to mutilate and kill people? Seems not probable. Would Toyota or any other car manufacturer sue Arabs et al. for turning their pickups into rolling suicide bombs?

pvaldes 2y ago
Toyota will definitely sue to death somebody --selling-- thousands of new Toyotas modified in mass to kill their drivers. If not, they would be sued massively instead, so is not something that they could just let pass. If the owner wants later to trow their Toyota over a cliff is a different problem and not Toyota's business.

onemoresoop 2y ago

> If Gold Apollo wants to keep selling pagers, better they start making all the carcasses on their products transparent from now on. With a big photo in the boxes showing how the correct product must look. I don't think that would make a difference at all, explosives could be disguised in any electronic components, being transparent wouldn't help very much. The Taiwanese company's brand is now irreparably tarnished, I think that is the cost of lending the brand name to an untrustworthy partner.

refurb 2y ago

Can a company sue you because you modified their product? Even if that modification caused harm?

remram 2y ago
Am intermediary can be sued just for damaging products through insufficient, they can certainly be sued for adding defects on purpose. Especially lethal defects.
- echoangle 2y ago
  But can the manufacturer sue? Isn’t the normal way that the customer sues, because their stuff was damaged? Can the manufacturer sue me if I buy their stuff, modify it to be deadly, and sell it again? (I don’t mean “can the sue me” but “do they have any chance of winning” of course)
  - pvaldes 2y ago
    > But can the manufacturer sue? do they have any chance of winning? For Gold Apollo the dilemma here is either to sue the Israel Government (and try to survive the experience as company), or to take the piss and be sued for the families of the people mutilated by "their" product. They are in a difficult position. It depends on how deep are their pockets and what they think will do less damage to the brand. Also if it has Taiwanese government support or not (unlikely as they probably depend on Israel technology for defense); and if Taiwan companies team with them or not. If the "made in Taiwan" sector want to keep selling radios and pagers to the rest of the planet they need to assure that this can't happen again. I assume that the consequences for Israel will be indirect, limited and approved by USA, or none.
    - pvaldes 2y ago
      Update: Gold Apollo is a small company with about 30 employees. The CEO said that this was humiliating, the products were made by a distributor in Hungary and that they were ruined for that. Small chances that they could sue anybody.