17 ms·

How Israel’s bulky pager fooled Hezbollah

104 points by nabla9 2y ago

wiz21c 2y ago
So did Mossad listen to the pagers ? I mean, instead of putting a bomb inside, spying would make more sense to me...
- ndheebebe 2y ago
  Did they want a war
- preisschild 2y ago
  Maybe they sent coded messages. Pager communications would be easily decryptable without having supplied the pagers.
- owenmarshall 2y ago
  Technically speaking that would be much harder: pagers don’t have microphones, and most don’t transmit - and those that do send very small messages. You’d have to add significant new capabilities to pull off surveillance, which would increase the risk of detection.
- krisoft 2y ago
  > spying would make more sense to me.. Probably they did. The problem with pager like communication is that it is very easy to employ codewords. Something like "if we send orange, bring your weapon and meet us at the market, if we send pear pack a week worth of stuff and meet us at the pumping station, if we send melon disappear to the countryside for two days". Monitoring that can give you a sense that "something is happening" but it won't tell you exactly what. So all in all it is not terribly valuable. But if I would be working for Hez I would assume that all communication over the pagers have been completely compromised.
  - owenmarshall 2y ago
    Of important note, none of that requires any modification to the pager. Paging protocols are ancient and unencrypted: a little SDR stick and you can run your own sigint on your local pager network.
- EasyMark 2y ago
  That seems like a big risk to take though? The best scenario is they get these out to all the leaders and do what they did. Why would you risk that with “random” signals coming out of the pagers occasionally that might get spotted by the some Hezbollah member who also is good at radio/digital comms. It seems unlikely they did anything other than what they did which was set them all up for a crotch bomb.
- gamblor956 2y ago
  Yes, the WaPo and NYT both reported that Mossad spent a fair amount of time eavesdropping on the communications between these two devices. The eavesdropping played a significant role in the decision to detonate the devices.
- red-iron-pine 2y ago
  thats the point of the bombs -- they can't be listened in on, so it's the only way to compromise them
myth_drannon 2y ago
[flagged]
- SteveSmith16384 2y ago
  Let's not go down this route here.
- adhamsalama 2y ago
  Israel has killed (and still is) killing tens of thousands of women and children, and starving the rest of the population.
  - invalidname 2y ago
    If this were true you would see a lawsuit based on Leahy law in the states. The fact is it's just not. Israel has held aid occasionally but most of the problem with supplies have to do with Hamas stealing them. https://www.state.gov/key-topics-bureau-of-democracy-human-rights-and-labor/human-rights/leahy-law-fact-sheet/ https://www.state.gov/key-topics-bureau-of-democracy-human-r... I don't support a lot of the stuff Israel is doing but painting it in this light is deeply incorrect and unfortunately hurts Palestinians. Both sides escalate and the result of such escalations are always worse for the weaker side.
    - adhamsalama 2y ago
      A law in the states against Israel? Are you trying to be funny?
      - invalidname 2y ago
        Did you bother reading that link? I suggest sticking to facts rather than biases and fake information online.
    - einszwei 2y ago
      https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/10/09/opinion/gaza-doctor-interviews.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/10/09/opinion/gaza-... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/18/us-supply-weapons-israel-alleged-abuses-human-rights https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/18/us-supply-weap... I'll leave these here if you are willing to accept that Laws can and will be selectively applied by governments.
preisschild 2y ago
[flagged]
yieldcrv 2y ago
Alright boomers, if your website has “contact us” for pricing instead of a two-click way to order it digitally then I’m going to assume you are placing bombs inside your electronics
- nabla9 2y ago
  "contact us" means that they don't want _you_ to contact them. Where I work "contact us" usually means more than €5000 in sales and there is too much to negotiate on price to give a quote.
  - barryrandall 2y ago
    It also usually indicates that prices are based on who you are instead of what you're buying.
- anotherhue 2y ago
  For many business the relationship is more important than the product (they'll probably send you free units if you're considering a large order). Hence why this has pretty much destroyed these businesses.
kreyenborgi 2y ago
https://www.reuters.com/graphics/ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS/ANNIVERSARY-GAZA-RUBBLE/akveegbnlvr/ https://www.reuters.com/graphics/ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS/ANNIVER... linked from there was also worth reading. Staggering.
- myth_drannon 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - SteveSmith16384 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - myth_drannon 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - dang 2y ago
        Would you please stop posting this sort of battle comment to HN? You've been doing it repeatedly and breaking the site guidelines in the process. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for—regardless of which war, or which side you're for or against. I know other commenters have been doing it too, but your comments (and comment history) stand out among the ones I've looked at in this thread so far. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
throw32i3ii 2y ago
Key components are 6 grams of white pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN) and "highly flammable material" as a detonator. PETN was developed in 1906, and is accessible to more advanced hobby chemists. So we have explosive device that passes through airport security scanner. And can be made at home by dedicated individuals... What are the implications for air travel?
- owenmarshall 2y ago
  Airlines are already banning pagers and walkie talkies. I wonder how many duds are currently being processed by Hezbollah right now. (0): https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/07/world/middleeast/emirates-bans-pagers-and-walkie-talkies-on-flights-after-attacks.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/07/world/middleeast/emirates...
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > Airlines are already banning pagers and walkie talkies The threat vector OP refers to is a terrorist packaging this into e.g. a laptop.
- gizmondo 2y ago
  The trick is probably not to make PETN, but to package it in such a way there are no traces of it outside? There are likely no implications for air travel. At least I always assumed that advanced state actors can make explosives that are undetectable by airport security scanners.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > we have explosive device that passes through airport security scanner I don't think it passes through modern American scanners--they can theoretically discriminate plastic explosives (and presumably detonators) from water, though whether it gets caught is a matter of TSA competence.
  - digdugdirk 2y ago
    The explosive is completely sealed inside the battery casing. It's highly likely to be undetectable. Part of the reason why this is one of those "cat out of the bag" type things.
avnfish 2y ago
Wow, they did a licensing deal with a legitimate manufacturer in Taiwan to get the battery listed on official websites? This runs so much deeper than I expected. Supply chains are one heck of an attack surface...
- soco 2y ago
  I wonder who else bought such special batteries, whether they were/are aware of that...
  - defen 2y ago
    The battery wasn't actually for sale; they just created fake product pages for it so that if anyone looked up the part number, it wouldn't be immediately obvious that it was fake.
    - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
      Supply chains aren't perfect. There is legitimacy to asking if any of the pagers or walkie talkies wound up elsewhere.
matthberg 2y ago
This section of the literal Geneva Convention [1], which Israel is a signatory of [2] seems rather relevant. While this article's breakdown of the what's and how's is quite interesting, keeping international law in mind while talking about the attack seems important. - "2. It is prohibited to use booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects which are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material." [1]: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/ccw-amended-protocol-ii-1996/article-7 https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/ccw-amended-p... [2]: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/ccw-amended-protocol-ii-1996/state-parties https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/ccw-amended-p...
- orwin 2y ago
  Yeah, it's the definition of a terror attack. The really bad part is how lauded the Mossad was for it's 'precision' by the western media. Geneva convention violations, random children killed because Hezbollah militant were shopping/walking nearby, really 'precise'... On the other hand killing only 5 children for two hundred opposants, and not at least twice as much is proof that Mossad is a hundred of time more precise than tsahal. But maybe that's a low bar.
  - myth_drannon 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - tptacek 2y ago
    A terror attack definitionally targets civilian noncombatants, deliberately.
    - aspenmayer 2y ago
      Not necessarily. The attack on USS Cole is considered a terror attack despite its explicitly military target. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Cole_bombing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Cole_bombing
    - orwin 2y ago
mortenjorck 2y ago
Curious why this is currently flagged. It’s an in-depth look at what is almost certainly the most sophisticated and consequential physical supply-chain attack in history, and will be covered in security textbooks for years to come.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- joezydeco 2y ago
  Pretty sure our own NSA is doing way more advanced stuff. This is just a peek (from 10 years ago): https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/photos-of-an-nsa-upgrade-factory-show-cisco-router-getting-implant/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/photos-of-an-nsa...
bhouston 2y ago
Leon Panetta, the former head of the CIA, said that the indiscriminate nature of these attacks makes him consider these attacks to be a form of terrorism: https://thehill.com/policy/international/4893900-leon-panetta-lebanon-explosions-terrorism/ https://thehill.com/policy/international/4893900-leon-panett... Volker Türk, the UN commission for human rights "explained that international law prohibits the use of booby-trapped items used in daily life, and 'it is a war crime to commit violence intended to spread terror among civilians.'" https://newrepublic.com/post/186244/leon-panetta-israel-lebanon-pagers-terrorism https://newrepublic.com/post/186244/leon-panetta-israel-leba... Also covered by Human Rights Watch here criticizing the indiscriminate nature of the attacks means they were against IHL: https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2024/09/19 https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2024/09/19
- tptacek 2y ago
  These takes are problematic because it's clear to most observers that the attacks were, by the standards set by ground combat in Fallujah, NATO air operations in Kunar Province, or operations against ISIL in Inherent Resolve, the pager/radio attacks were drastically more discriminating, and caused a tiny fraction of the noncombatant casualties. This, of course, is also a distorted standard capturing only NATO/aligned combat operations; the picture gets much worse if you pull in Gulf State military operations, Azerbaijan, or Russia/Ukraine. (Turk's booby-trap argument is challenging for two additional reasons; the first is that the encrypted pagers and ICOM radios we're discussing are military command & control equipment, not items used "in daily life" in the sense contemplated by the booby trap convention, and further the definition of a booby trap in that convention involves a device triggered when random people approach it, not one detonated at a specific instruction by the party that placed it. The history of the booby trap convention is tied up in the human cost of unwinding booby traps after conflicts have wound down, which is not a problem the pagers posed.) I'm concerned that people attempting (reasonably!) to communicate disapproval for IDF operations generally are damaging their credibility by trying to fold the pager/radio attack into their message. To me, the pager/radio attack is damning for an entirely different reason: with proper seriousness and resourcing, it's clear that Israel was able to incapacitate a near-peer military adversary with vastly lower noncombatant cost than what they've managed in Gaza.
JoeyBananas 2y ago
The term "terrorism" is often misused. According the the actual definition, terrorism is about inciting fear and the unintended consequences that this entails, and it does not necessarily have to involve civilian casualties. For example, imagine firing a gun in a shopping mall without killing anybody. The entire mall still has to be evacuated, people start screaming, the firefighters, paramedics, and SWAT team show up, the stores have to hire a security guard, and shoppers are afraid to return. Everyone blames the mayor for not preventing the incident from occurring in the first place, and the mayor is pressured to enact new gun laws and set up a new checkpoint. These things happen even if there was no actual danger because it was a blank cartridge and not live ammunition. The same effect occurs when you drop bombs on a city. All of the sudden it is no longer desirable to live in that city, even if it was a very precise bombing. If you infiltrate supply chains and plant bombs, nobody trusts the global markets, people have to spend more money on inspections, manufacturers have to pay more for insurance, there are endless consequences
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
janalsncm 2y ago
If these pager explosives were invisible to x-ray machines then hopefully the TSA has a way to detect them. Seems like a pretty clear attack vector.
- Qem 2y ago
  It was lucky none of the thousands of pagers employed in this terror attack blew inside some airplane and made it much worse. It's dismaying we have a state doing this.
- markus_zhang 2y ago
  My thought: what if some extremists, who are not in short supply given the current condition decide to do a copy-cat attack on major airports simultaneously? Are the machines guaranteed to identify each one of them? I mean the tech doesn't look too hard even for dedicated individuals, let alone quasi-state actors.
markus_zhang 2y ago
> Gold Apollo’s chairman, Hsu Ching-kuang, told reporters a day after the pager attack that he was approached about three years ago by a former employee, Teresa Wu, and her “big boss, called Tom” to discuss a licence agreement. > Hsu said he had scant information about Wu’s superior, but he granted them the right to design their own products and market them under the widely distributed Gold Apollo brand. Reuters could not establish the identity of the manager, nor whether the person or Wu knowingly worked with Israeli intelligence. These make me wonder whether major players would quickly allocate production to their own countries as well as their vassal countries where they can comfortably spy on. It is not that difficult for a major player to infiltrate a foreign civilian product factory, say, produces lower end MCUs that are used in infrastructure, find a list of customers and plan accordingly. And in this case it is very suspicious that Hsu did not even ask any questions.
javatuts 2y ago
Well done Israel !!!

104 points by nabla9 2y ago

wiz21c 2y ago

So did Mossad listen to the pagers ? I mean, instead of putting a bomb inside, spying would make more sense to me...

ndheebebe 2y ago
Did they want a war
preisschild 2y ago
Maybe they sent coded messages. Pager communications would be easily decryptable without having supplied the pagers.
owenmarshall 2y ago
Technically speaking that would be much harder: pagers don’t have microphones, and most don’t transmit - and those that do send very small messages. You’d have to add significant new capabilities to pull off surveillance, which would increase the risk of detection.
krisoft 2y ago
> spying would make more sense to me.. Probably they did. The problem with pager like communication is that it is very easy to employ codewords. Something like "if we send orange, bring your weapon and meet us at the market, if we send pear pack a week worth of stuff and meet us at the pumping station, if we send melon disappear to the countryside for two days". Monitoring that can give you a sense that "something is happening" but it won't tell you exactly what. So all in all it is not terribly valuable. But if I would be working for Hez I would assume that all communication over the pagers have been completely compromised.
- owenmarshall 2y ago
  Of important note, none of that requires any modification to the pager. Paging protocols are ancient and unencrypted: a little SDR stick and you can run your own sigint on your local pager network.
EasyMark 2y ago
That seems like a big risk to take though? The best scenario is they get these out to all the leaders and do what they did. Why would you risk that with “random” signals coming out of the pagers occasionally that might get spotted by the some Hezbollah member who also is good at radio/digital comms. It seems unlikely they did anything other than what they did which was set them all up for a crotch bomb.
gamblor956 2y ago
Yes, the WaPo and NYT both reported that Mossad spent a fair amount of time eavesdropping on the communications between these two devices. The eavesdropping played a significant role in the decision to detonate the devices.
red-iron-pine 2y ago
thats the point of the bombs -- they can't be listened in on, so it's the only way to compromise them

myth_drannon 2y ago

[flagged]

SteveSmith16384 2y ago
Let's not go down this route here.
adhamsalama 2y ago
Israel has killed (and still is) killing tens of thousands of women and children, and starving the rest of the population.
- invalidname 2y ago
  If this were true you would see a lawsuit based on Leahy law in the states. The fact is it's just not. Israel has held aid occasionally but most of the problem with supplies have to do with Hamas stealing them. https://www.state.gov/key-topics-bureau-of-democracy-human-rights-and-labor/human-rights/leahy-law-fact-sheet/ https://www.state.gov/key-topics-bureau-of-democracy-human-r... I don't support a lot of the stuff Israel is doing but painting it in this light is deeply incorrect and unfortunately hurts Palestinians. Both sides escalate and the result of such escalations are always worse for the weaker side.
  - adhamsalama 2y ago
    A law in the states against Israel? Are you trying to be funny?
    - invalidname 2y ago
      Did you bother reading that link? I suggest sticking to facts rather than biases and fake information online.
  - einszwei 2y ago
    https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/10/09/opinion/gaza-doctor-interviews.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/10/09/opinion/gaza-... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/18/us-supply-weapons-israel-alleged-abuses-human-rights https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/18/us-supply-weap... I'll leave these here if you are willing to accept that Laws can and will be selectively applied by governments.

preisschild 2y ago

[flagged]

yieldcrv 2y ago

Alright boomers, if your website has “contact us” for pricing instead of a two-click way to order it digitally then I’m going to assume you are placing bombs inside your electronics

nabla9 2y ago
"contact us" means that they don't want _you_ to contact them. Where I work "contact us" usually means more than €5000 in sales and there is too much to negotiate on price to give a quote.
- barryrandall 2y ago
  It also usually indicates that prices are based on who you are instead of what you're buying.
anotherhue 2y ago
For many business the relationship is more important than the product (they'll probably send you free units if you're considering a large order). Hence why this has pretty much destroyed these businesses.

kreyenborgi 2y ago

https://www.reuters.com/graphics/ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS/ANNIVERSARY-GAZA-RUBBLE/akveegbnlvr/ https://www.reuters.com/graphics/ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS/ANNIVER... linked from there was also worth reading. Staggering.

myth_drannon 2y ago
[flagged]
- SteveSmith16384 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - myth_drannon 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - dang 2y ago
      Would you please stop posting this sort of battle comment to HN? You've been doing it repeatedly and breaking the site guidelines in the process. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for—regardless of which war, or which side you're for or against. I know other commenters have been doing it too, but your comments (and comment history) stand out among the ones I've looked at in this thread so far. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

throw32i3ii 2y ago

Key components are 6 grams of white pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN) and "highly flammable material" as a detonator. PETN was developed in 1906, and is accessible to more advanced hobby chemists. So we have explosive device that passes through airport security scanner. And can be made at home by dedicated individuals... What are the implications for air travel?

owenmarshall 2y ago
Airlines are already banning pagers and walkie talkies. I wonder how many duds are currently being processed by Hezbollah right now. (0): https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/07/world/middleeast/emirates-bans-pagers-and-walkie-talkies-on-flights-after-attacks.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/07/world/middleeast/emirates...
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > Airlines are already banning pagers and walkie talkies The threat vector OP refers to is a terrorist packaging this into e.g. a laptop.
gizmondo 2y ago
The trick is probably not to make PETN, but to package it in such a way there are no traces of it outside? There are likely no implications for air travel. At least I always assumed that advanced state actors can make explosives that are undetectable by airport security scanners.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> we have explosive device that passes through airport security scanner I don't think it passes through modern American scanners--they can theoretically discriminate plastic explosives (and presumably detonators) from water, though whether it gets caught is a matter of TSA competence.
- digdugdirk 2y ago
  The explosive is completely sealed inside the battery casing. It's highly likely to be undetectable. Part of the reason why this is one of those "cat out of the bag" type things.

avnfish 2y ago

Wow, they did a licensing deal with a legitimate manufacturer in Taiwan to get the battery listed on official websites? This runs so much deeper than I expected. Supply chains are one heck of an attack surface...

soco 2y ago
I wonder who else bought such special batteries, whether they were/are aware of that...
- defen 2y ago
  The battery wasn't actually for sale; they just created fake product pages for it so that if anyone looked up the part number, it wouldn't be immediately obvious that it was fake.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    Supply chains aren't perfect. There is legitimacy to asking if any of the pagers or walkie talkies wound up elsewhere.

matthberg 2y ago

This section of the literal Geneva Convention [1], which Israel is a signatory of [2] seems rather relevant. While this article's breakdown of the what's and how's is quite interesting, keeping international law in mind while talking about the attack seems important. - "2. It is prohibited to use booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects which are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material." [1]: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/ccw-amended-protocol-ii-1996/article-7 https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/ccw-amended-p... [2]: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/ccw-amended-protocol-ii-1996/state-parties https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/ihl-treaties/ccw-amended-p...

orwin 2y ago
Yeah, it's the definition of a terror attack. The really bad part is how lauded the Mossad was for it's 'precision' by the western media. Geneva convention violations, random children killed because Hezbollah militant were shopping/walking nearby, really 'precise'... On the other hand killing only 5 children for two hundred opposants, and not at least twice as much is proof that Mossad is a hundred of time more precise than tsahal. But maybe that's a low bar.
- myth_drannon 2y ago
  [flagged]
- tptacek 2y ago
  A terror attack definitionally targets civilian noncombatants, deliberately.
  - aspenmayer 2y ago
    Not necessarily. The attack on USS Cole is considered a terror attack despite its explicitly military target. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Cole_bombing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Cole_bombing
  - orwin 2y ago

mortenjorck 2y ago

Curious why this is currently flagged. It’s an in-depth look at what is almost certainly the most sophisticated and consequential physical supply-chain attack in history, and will be covered in security textbooks for years to come.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
joezydeco 2y ago
Pretty sure our own NSA is doing way more advanced stuff. This is just a peek (from 10 years ago): https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/photos-of-an-nsa-upgrade-factory-show-cisco-router-getting-implant/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/05/photos-of-an-nsa...

bhouston 2y ago

Leon Panetta, the former head of the CIA, said that the indiscriminate nature of these attacks makes him consider these attacks to be a form of terrorism: https://thehill.com/policy/international/4893900-leon-panetta-lebanon-explosions-terrorism/ https://thehill.com/policy/international/4893900-leon-panett... Volker Türk, the UN commission for human rights "explained that international law prohibits the use of booby-trapped items used in daily life, and 'it is a war crime to commit violence intended to spread terror among civilians.'" https://newrepublic.com/post/186244/leon-panetta-israel-lebanon-pagers-terrorism https://newrepublic.com/post/186244/leon-panetta-israel-leba... Also covered by Human Rights Watch here criticizing the indiscriminate nature of the attacks means they were against IHL: https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2024/09/19 https://www.hrw.org/the-day-in-human-rights/2024/09/19

tptacek 2y ago
These takes are problematic because it's clear to most observers that the attacks were, by the standards set by ground combat in Fallujah, NATO air operations in Kunar Province, or operations against ISIL in Inherent Resolve, the pager/radio attacks were drastically more discriminating, and caused a tiny fraction of the noncombatant casualties. This, of course, is also a distorted standard capturing only NATO/aligned combat operations; the picture gets much worse if you pull in Gulf State military operations, Azerbaijan, or Russia/Ukraine. (Turk's booby-trap argument is challenging for two additional reasons; the first is that the encrypted pagers and ICOM radios we're discussing are military command & control equipment, not items used "in daily life" in the sense contemplated by the booby trap convention, and further the definition of a booby trap in that convention involves a device triggered when random people approach it, not one detonated at a specific instruction by the party that placed it. The history of the booby trap convention is tied up in the human cost of unwinding booby traps after conflicts have wound down, which is not a problem the pagers posed.) I'm concerned that people attempting (reasonably!) to communicate disapproval for IDF operations generally are damaging their credibility by trying to fold the pager/radio attack into their message. To me, the pager/radio attack is damning for an entirely different reason: with proper seriousness and resourcing, it's clear that Israel was able to incapacitate a near-peer military adversary with vastly lower noncombatant cost than what they've managed in Gaza.

JoeyBananas 2y ago

The term "terrorism" is often misused. According the the actual definition, terrorism is about inciting fear and the unintended consequences that this entails, and it does not necessarily have to involve civilian casualties. For example, imagine firing a gun in a shopping mall without killing anybody. The entire mall still has to be evacuated, people start screaming, the firefighters, paramedics, and SWAT team show up, the stores have to hire a security guard, and shoppers are afraid to return. Everyone blames the mayor for not preventing the incident from occurring in the first place, and the mayor is pressured to enact new gun laws and set up a new checkpoint. These things happen even if there was no actual danger because it was a blank cartridge and not live ammunition. The same effect occurs when you drop bombs on a city. All of the sudden it is no longer desirable to live in that city, even if it was a very precise bombing. If you infiltrate supply chains and plant bombs, nobody trusts the global markets, people have to spend more money on inspections, manufacturers have to pay more for insurance, there are endless consequences

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

janalsncm 2y ago

If these pager explosives were invisible to x-ray machines then hopefully the TSA has a way to detect them. Seems like a pretty clear attack vector.

Qem 2y ago
It was lucky none of the thousands of pagers employed in this terror attack blew inside some airplane and made it much worse. It's dismaying we have a state doing this.
markus_zhang 2y ago
My thought: what if some extremists, who are not in short supply given the current condition decide to do a copy-cat attack on major airports simultaneously? Are the machines guaranteed to identify each one of them? I mean the tech doesn't look too hard even for dedicated individuals, let alone quasi-state actors.

markus_zhang 2y ago

> Gold Apollo’s chairman, Hsu Ching-kuang, told reporters a day after the pager attack that he was approached about three years ago by a former employee, Teresa Wu, and her “big boss, called Tom” to discuss a licence agreement. > Hsu said he had scant information about Wu’s superior, but he granted them the right to design their own products and market them under the widely distributed Gold Apollo brand. Reuters could not establish the identity of the manager, nor whether the person or Wu knowingly worked with Israeli intelligence. These make me wonder whether major players would quickly allocate production to their own countries as well as their vassal countries where they can comfortably spy on. It is not that difficult for a major player to infiltrate a foreign civilian product factory, say, produces lower end MCUs that are used in infrastructure, find a list of customers and plan accordingly. And in this case it is very suspicious that Hsu did not even ask any questions.

javatuts 2y ago

Well done Israel !!!