New York Times quoting US officials: Israel planted explosives in pagers sold to Hezbollah by a Taiwanese company

The New York Times revealed new details about the Israeli cyber attack that targeted leaders of the Lebanese Hezbollah, yesterday afternoon, Tuesday, by blowing up the automatic pagers they had in their possession, and led to the killing and wounding of a large number of them, in an operation that is the first of its kind in the world to be carried out in this electronic manner so far.

Yesterday, the Lebanese health minister told state media that at least 11 people were killed and more than 2,700 injured.

Hezbollah accused Israel of orchestrating the attack, but gave only limited details about its understanding of the operation. Israel has not commented on the attack, nor said it was behind it.

The famous American newspaper quoted American officials and other officials familiar with the operation, who spoke to it on condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the operation, that small quantities of explosives were planted in pagers ordered by Hezbollah from a Taiwanese company.

According to the newspaper, Israel carried out its operation against Hezbollah on Tuesday by hiding explosive materials inside a new batch of Taiwanese-made pagers that were imported into Lebanon, according to American officials and other officials familiar with the operation.

Although it noted that, as of Tuesday, it was not yet clear when the pagers were ordered and when they arrived in Lebanon, it revealed that the operation was carried out by tampering with the pagers, which Hezbollah ordered from the Taiwanese company Gold Apollo, before they arrived in Lebanon, according to some officials. Most of them were the company’s AP924 model, although three other models from the same company were included in the shipment.

The explosives, weighing no more than one to two ounces (an ounce is roughly 28 grams), were planted next to the battery in each pager, two officials said. An electrical switch was also included that could be triggered remotely to detonate the explosives.

More than 3,000 pagers were ordered from Taiwanese company Gold Apollo , several officials said. Hezbollah distributed the pagers to its members across Lebanon, and some reached Hezbollah allies in Iran and Syria. The Israeli attack affected the pagers, which were working and receiving messages.

At 3:30 p.m. Lebanon time, the pagers received a message that appeared to be from Hezbollah leadership, according to two officials. Instead, the message activated the explosives. The devices were programmed to sound an alarm several seconds before exploding, according to three of the officials.

Independent cybersecurity experts who studied footage of the attacks said the force and speed of the explosions were clearly caused by some type of explosive material.

“These devices are likely to have been modified in some way to cause these types of explosions – the size and power of the explosion suggests it wasn’t just the battery,” said Mikko Hypponen, a research specialist at software company WithSecure and a cybercrime advisor to Europol.

The attacks targeted Hezbollah where they were most vulnerable, said Keren Elazari, a cybersecurity analyst and Israeli researcher at Tel Aviv University.

The newspaper notes that Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah had earlier this year strictly limited the use of cell phones, which he saw as increasingly vulnerable to Israeli surveillance, according to some officials as well as security experts.

“This attack hit them in the Achilles’ heel, because they took out a central communications medium,” Ms. Elazari said. “We’ve seen these types of devices, pagers, targeted before but never in an attack this sophisticated.”