The murky trail of Hezbollah’s exploding pagers to a Hungarian ‘consulting firm’

A Hungarian company that presents itself as a management consulting firm is being held responsible for the distribution of the thousands of pagers that exploded in Lebanon. How does the murky trail trace back to the world of consulting?

On Tuesday 17 September, thousands of pagers belonging to Hezbollah members exploded in Lebanon (and Syria) at around 15:30 local time. At least twelve people, including two children, were killed and almost 3.000 were injured. While no party has formally claimed responsibility for the attack, reports are unanimous in their thinking that the Israeli Mossad orchestrated the operation.

For many, the million-dollar question is: how did the Israeli secret service manage to pull this off, in what is described as one of the most unprecedented cyber-attacks seen in warfare? It is generally assumed that the pagers were sabotaged before they arrived in Beirut.

After the attack, photos emerged showing pagers with the logo of the Taiwanese company Gold Apollo. However, the founder of the company, Hsu Ching-Kuang, denied this morning that Gold Apollo had manufactured the pagers themselves. “The product was not ours. Our brand name was only on it,” he stated. “We are a responsible company. This is very shameful.”

The company founder instead pointed his finger at BAC Consulting, a Budapest-based company that claims to advise clients on innovation and sustainability, among other matters. The consulting firm bills itself as a boutique, active in various sectors, including publishing, media, and oil & gas.

According to a statement by Gold Apollo, the Taiwanese company has been working with BAC Consulting for three years. Through a long-term partnership, the Hungarian company has a license to produce and market various products under the Gold Apollo name. However, “the design and production of these products are the sole responsibility of BAC Consulting,” said Ching-Kuang.

‘Largest supply chain attack ever’

Whether the Hungarian company was involved in any way in the processing of the explosives in the pagers is unknown. Several experts believe it is likely that the sabotage took place during the production process, and not when the pagers were in transit to Lebanon.

Videos of the attack on social media suggest that the “explosive devices were integrated into the pagers,” said N.R. Jenzen-Jones, a weapons and ammunition expert and researcher at Nottingham Trent University. “The scale suggests a complex supply-chain attack, rather than a scenario in which devices were intercepted and modified in transit.”

“This looks to be perhaps the most extensive physical supply chain attack in history,” commented Dmitri Alperovitch, chairman of the Silverado Policy Accelerator, a US national security think tank.

Undetected for months

A senior source from the Lebanese security service told Reuters that the Mossad had modified the devices “at production level.” According to the same source, Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Europe, under license from Gold Apollo. According to a second source within the security service, the pagers contained around three grams of explosives, which went “unnoticed” within Hezbollah for months.

According to Israeli sources, it was decided to activate the explosives now because Hezbollah members suspected that the pagers had been tampered with.

The militant movement, viewed by many governments as a terrorist organisation despite also serving as a political party in Lebanese politics, often uses pagers instead of mobile phones, to prevent their location from being revealed or their communications from being intercepted. Hassan Nasrallah, the chief of Hezbollah, had earlier this year urged its militants to adopt the pagers and stop using their mobile phones.

Company name taped to window

At the time of writing, Hungary-based BAC Consulting remains shrouded in secrecy. After the news broke of its alleged role, the company’s website went dark.

Records from Consultancy.org show that BAC Consulting was founded in 2022, with its leaders having “more than a decade of consulting experience” and its team currently five-strong.

Obviously, manufacturing and exporting pagers has nothing to do with advisory services. That is also what Cristiana Bársony-Arcidiacono, the CEO of BAC Consulting, told NBC News in a phone interview. In the short discussion, she acknowledged that BAC Consulting works with Gold Apollo, but denies any further involvement: “We don’t make the pagers. We’re just the intermediary. I think you’re wrong in your trail.”

The fact that the consultancy firm is based in Hungary has meanwhile led to rumours that Israel and Hungary cooperated on the matter, with some pointing at the close ties between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his Hungarian counterpart Viktor Orbán.