Israel informed the United States on Tuesday of the attack in which explosives hidden in pagers were detonated, the Associated Press (AP) quoted a US official as saying.
The AR-924 pagers used in Tuesday’s attack were manufactured by BAC Consulting KFT in Budapest, Hungary, according to a statement by Taiwan’s Gold Apollo, which authorised the use of its brand name on the pagers.
BAC is suspected of being a shell company. No one has ever been seen at the BAC office in Budapest, Sputnik reported.
Gold Apollo chairman Hsu Ching-kuang told reporters on Wednesday that the company had a licensing agreement with BAC for the past three years.
The shell company registered in Hungary in May 2022
BAC Consulting, a limited liability company, was registered in May 2022, according to company records. The company has a share capital of €7,840 and generated revenues of $725,768 in 2022 and $593,972 in 2023, records show.
BAC is registered in the name of Cristiana Rosaria Bársony-Arcidiacono, who describes herself on her LinkedIn page as a strategic consultant and business developer.
Among other things, Bársony-Arcidiacono says on her page that she is on the board of the Earth Child Institute, a sustainability group. The group’s website does not list Bársony-Arcidiacono as a board member.
The battery life of the pager was the reason for its popularity in Lebanon
Experts believe the pagers were packed with explosives before delivery. According to the specifications advertised on Gold Apollo’s website before it was removed after the attack, the AR-924 pager, advertised as ‘rugged’, contains a rechargeable lithium battery.
The battery life was claimed to be up to 85 days. This is important in Lebanon, where power cuts are common after years of economic collapse.
The pagers also operate on a different radio network to mobile phones, making them more resilient in emergencies. This is one of the reasons why many hospitals around the world still rely on them.
Taiwan’s Ministry of Economic Affairs said Gold Apollo had exported 260,000 sets of pagers from early 2022 to August 2024, including more than 40,000 sets between January and August this year.
The ministry said there was no record of any direct export of Gold Apollo pagers to Lebanon.
How was the attack planned?
According to Lebanese security sources quoted by AP, Israel planted explosives in 5,000 pagers months before the deadly blasts.
A senior Lebanese security source said the Israeli spy service had implanted thousands of pagers with explosives activated by encrypted messages during production, months before they were imported by Hezbollah.
Some experts told AP that the explosions were most likely the result of interference in the supply chain.
Very small explosives could have been placed in the pagers before they were delivered to the Lebanese and then detonated remotely, possibly by radio signal, all at the same time.
Carlos Perez, director of security intelligence at TrustedSec, said that at the time of the attack ‘the battery was probably half explosive and half real’.
A former British Army bomb disposal officer explained that an explosive device has five main components: A container, a battery, a trigger, a detonator and an explosive charge.
“A pager already has three of these,” said the former officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is currently advising clients in the Middle East. You just have to add the detonator and the explosive charge,” he said.
Magnier: The devices were delivered more than 6 months ago
Elijah J. Magnier, a Brussels-based journalist with more than 37 years’ experience in the region, said he had interviewed Hezbollah members and survivors of Tuesday’s pager attack and that the pagers had been supplied more than six months ago.
The pagers worked perfectly for six months,” Magnier said, adding that what triggered the explosion appeared to be an error message sent to all the devices.
Magnier also said that based on his conversations with Hezbollah members, many pagers did not explode, allowing the group to inspect them.
Magnier said they concluded that a highly explosive substance of between 3 and 5 grams had been hidden or embedded in the circuitry.
