The Mysterious Trail of Hezbollah’s Exploding Pagers
The search for who was behind the manufacturing, sale and distribution of the pagers has pointed to some companies that were created in recent years, with little to no paper trail of their activities and run by mysterious business people with a vague online footprint and little experience in the telecommunications industry.
Supply-chain attacks (which are not "hacks" in the conventional sense but might involve some hacking in the execution) have been an established threat in the software world for some time now.
This current attack on Hezbollah's pagers, widely assumed to have been conducted by Israeli operatives, breaks new ground. Dramatically.
And, clearly, underlines new concerns. Intricate international supply chains have become commonplace and the global enterprise is honeycombed with shell companies and ambiguities both legal and political. A lot hinges on just plain trust — which may not be so just plain anymore. And the amount of tweaking it would take to modify, say, a microchip is literally microscopic.
O brave new world.
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