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Mossad planted explosives in Hezbollah’s beepers 5 months ago, detonated them remotely – report

On Tuesday, at least eleven were killed, and 4,000 people were wounded in Lebanon when beepers exploded simultaneously. 

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

According to Sky News Arabia, sources report that Mossad ensured explosives were implanted into the pagers and heated them remotely, causing them to detonate.

On Tuesday, at least 11 were killed, and 4,000 people were wounded in Lebanon when beepers exploded simultaneously.

Most of those killed or injured were Hezbollah terrorists.

The report indicates that PETN, a highly explosive material, was implanted in the batteries of the beepers.

The weight of the PETN explosives was less than 20 grams, and it is believed they were obtained and implanted 5 months ago.

This was possible only through close cooperation with the manufacturer, who must have consented to the supply chain disruption.

In an interview with Ma’ariv, Oleg Brodt, Director of Research, Development, and Innovation at Ben-Gurion University’s Cyber Labs, explained, “Many attacks occur by compromising the supply chain. Like a beeper, an electronic device contains numerous components, and each could be infected with malware.”

He added, “This malware could be designed to raise the device’s temperature, cause a malfunction, ignite it, or even trigger an explosion.”

Brodt explained, “In such cases, it’s essential to make the changes to the device without raising suspicion during the quality inspection.”

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Once implanted on the batteries of the beeper, the explosives were detonated by heating them up remotely.

This might have been done using a “kill switch,” as it is called in the cyber world.

The kill switch is software designed to detonate a device at a certain time. It can be set off using a code word or even gibberish.

“It’s possible to set up a non-standard message—something unusual or even gibberish—broadcast to hundreds or thousands of devices simultaneously, causing simultaneous ignition and explosion,” Brodt explained.

“The radio waves the device receives are translated into a unique message that triggers a chain of events leading to the explosion.”