Pager Blasts: Are mobile phones vulnerable, too?

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New Delhi: Social-media was abuzz with the fear of what the simultaneous explosion of pagers and walkie-talkies used by Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah members meant for smartphone users..

The simultaneous explosions of pagers across Lebanon and Syria left thousands injured and many dead, according to media reports. in what seems to be an unprecedented, coordinated attack using telecommunication devices...

According to reports, the batteries of the pagers were laced with explosives and shipped to Lebanon after Hezbollah decided to switch to low-tech devices fearing that mobile phones were being used to spy on them...

When a smartphone battery overheats, you will notice smoke and fire," Robert said.. Experts also said that while in theory, threat actors can exploit existing vulnerabilities to cause them to overheat or malfunction, it would be far more difficult to conduct a mass-scale attack due to the many layers of security in the software as well as safety measures incorporated in handsets to keep them from exploding...

"Given how diversified the global smartphone supply chain is, a motivated threat actor can tamper with the internal hardware to introduce an explosive charge," said Amit Jaju, senior managing director, at Ankura, a multinational cybersecurity firm...