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Pager and Now Walkie-Talkie Attacks on Hezbollah

1 points by russfink 2y ago

russfink 2y ago
If I may speculate, then opine, (1) was the attacker more than just able to compromise the supply chain, were they able to BECOME part of the supply chain? The credentials of the BAC corporation seem highly suspect. (2) The execution of this attack was really dumb. Like that STTNG episode about the Borg, the attack could only be used once per type of device. The attack apparently struck ALL devices all at once, rather than limiting the effect to a select group of people, or even one at a time. Even so, whoever commanded the pager attack must have belatedly thought to command the walkie-talkie attack, perhaps realizing that Hezbollah would be suspicious of other items purchased around the same time. If I were Hezbollah, I would throw away all laptops, phones, ... garage door openers ... and replace w/several different vendors of device, now and forever going forward. So why this attack and why right now? For what reason is the attacker so pressed to carry this off right now? Because they ruined any possible future use of the attack. I'm not taking sides here, just trying to rationalize the use of this capability. Seems like it is just to send a message. [EDIT] perhaps "all at once" was necessary because there is no way to know who gets what pager/walkie. Somehow children got some of these - don't know how. People pawning these pagers/walkies? People losing them, or kids stealing them?
- quantified 2y ago
  It would make more sense if there were some other offensive action started to make use of the chaos and communication breakdown. Otherwise, it seems like a flex without strategic benefit. Could have been a misfire.
  - russfink 2y ago
    Agreed.
raincom 2y ago
This will force Iranians make their own pagers and wallow-talks in the long term. In the short term, hezbollah members are forced to use mobile phones, making easy for Israelis to snoop on.
- bigfatkitten 2y ago
  Terrestrial mobile phones are unreliable in that corner of the world. This will force top commanders to go back to using their Thuraya satellite handsets. These handsets do not work without reporting their GNSS position (in cleartext) to the network, and they do not work indoors. This is exactly what you want your adversary to use when you have drones and a mature SIGINT capability.
JSDevOps 2y ago
Anyone else suspect it’ll be mobile phones next?

1 points by russfink 2y ago

If I may speculate, then opine, (1) was the attacker more than just able to compromise the supply chain, were they able to BECOME part of the supply chain? The credentials of the BAC corporation seem highly suspect. (2) The execution of this attack was really dumb. Like that STTNG episode about the Borg, the attack could only be used once per type of device. The attack apparently struck ALL devices all at once, rather than limiting the effect to a select group of people, or even one at a time. Even so, whoever commanded the pager attack must have belatedly thought to command the walkie-talkie attack, perhaps realizing that Hezbollah would be suspicious of other items purchased around the same time. If I were Hezbollah, I would throw away all laptops, phones, ... garage door openers ... and replace w/several different vendors of device, now and forever going forward. So why this attack and why right now? For what reason is the attacker so pressed to carry this off right now? Because they ruined any possible future use of the attack. I'm not taking sides here, just trying to rationalize the use of this capability. Seems like it is just to send a message. [EDIT] perhaps "all at once" was necessary because there is no way to know who gets what pager/walkie. Somehow children got some of these - don't know how. People pawning these pagers/walkies? People losing them, or kids stealing them?

quantified 2y ago
It would make more sense if there were some other offensive action started to make use of the chaos and communication breakdown. Otherwise, it seems like a flex without strategic benefit. Could have been a misfire.
- russfink 2y ago
  Agreed.

raincom 2y ago

This will force Iranians make their own pagers and wallow-talks in the long term. In the short term, hezbollah members are forced to use mobile phones, making easy for Israelis to snoop on.

bigfatkitten 2y ago
Terrestrial mobile phones are unreliable in that corner of the world. This will force top commanders to go back to using their Thuraya satellite handsets. These handsets do not work without reporting their GNSS position (in cleartext) to the network, and they do not work indoors. This is exactly what you want your adversary to use when you have drones and a mature SIGINT capability.

JSDevOps 2y ago

Anyone else suspect it’ll be mobile phones next?