Comment by pvaldes

Comment by pvaldes 2 days ago

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I wouldn't wish to be in the PR damage control team of Gold Apollo right now.

This was a direct attack to their survival as company. Will they sue Israeli government for turning their product into a bomb used to mutilate and kill people? Seems not probable.

Will they sue the Hungarian company making the bombs? That would be a more realistic target. Now Hezbollah has an excuse to attack Hungary interests in the EU and the conflict could escalate. That company should be crushed and closed for good by the Hungarian law system IMO. Either you are a military grade company or you aren't.

If Gold Apollo wants to keep selling pagers, better they start making all the carcasses on their products transparent from now on. With a big photo in the boxes showing how the correct product must look.

oytis 2 days ago

> That company should be crushed and closed for good by the Hungarian law system IMO. Either you are a military grade company or you aren't.

Were the pagers military grade? Hungarian company providing military equipment to Hezbollah would be a scandal on its own.

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  • pvaldes 2 days ago

    I assume that you, as a company, need a special permit to manufacture lethal weapons or military products on EU. Either you have it, or you don't. And if you don't have and still do it, I understand that you are breaking a dozen of EU laws.

    The EU now needs to do something about it, and do it fast. Or to pretend that nothing happened, surrender to Israel, create a dangerous legal precedent "for the cause" and send a clear message that EU manufacture laws are a joke: "All those security filters painfully raised around EU products worth zero and can be easily jumped over". This is a really bad message for all the EU makers.

    A franchise of your brand also signed a contract to make your product. I assume that changing the functionality or specifications of your registered product is strictly forbidden in that contract. I bet that this move violated some laws on Taiwan also.

    If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo I would be fuming and furious at this moment.

    Israel not only pushed them into the middle of a war that is not their war, without their consent or knowledge; also destroyed the brand image and painted a target in the backs of each employee and reseller of Gold Apollo.

    At this moment, nothing suggests that the Taiwan based company were part of this. They should apologize, clear things, and detach themselves from this PR mess as soon as possible.

    I understand that from the Mossad point of view this can be a big success, but from the point of view of the companies that try to sell their legit products, this is an direct attack.

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    • prepend 2 days ago

      > Israel not only pushed them into the middle of a war that is not their war, without their consent or knowledge;

      Weren’t they already selling pagers to Hezbollah? It seems like they were already in the war as a supplier of goods to a terrorist organization.

      I wonder if this is why Israel made this move because the manufacturer was already breaking international sanction by supplying Hezbollah so they have little recourse.

      If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo, I’d be investigating why my franchisee was selling stuff to Hezbollah in the first place.

      But it’s beepers and only 5,000. How expensive is this at the end of the day? It’s probably the last time a company lends then brand name for a small amount.

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      • pvaldes 2 days ago

        > Weren’t [Gold Apollo] already selling pagers to Hezbollah?

        Selling pagers to Lebanon citizens is legal if I'm not wrong.

        Not necessarily. At this moment, all suggests that somebody (Ehem, Mossad) was impersonating a reseller of the brand [1]. How do they knew that the buyers were from Hezbollah?. Did the buyers wear a t-shirt?. What if somebody was buying it to resell it later and bank some profit?. This stuff could ended being sold to innocent people, or distributed by all the schools of Lebanon.

        [1] New facts can change this picture and I may be wrong about this.

        > If I was the CEO of Gold Apollo, I’d be investigating why my franchisee was selling stuff to Hezbollah in the first place.

        Agree. Definitely, the maker should make a move about that, just to be sure. And to be very transparent about that investigation.

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      • dqv 2 days ago

        > Weren’t they already selling pagers to Hezbollah?

        Apollo pagers are everywhere and sold through resellers through out the world, even in the US. Let’s not do Hasbara-style speculation

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      • mihaic 2 days ago

        > Weren’t they already selling pagers to Hezbollah?

        I don't have info about those specific models, but this is pagers and not rockets. If someone makes an order for 5000 units I can't image you'd have an expectation to do a background check with references.

        It's basically like ordering 5000 units of Raspberry Pi, would you consider that a military export?

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      • aprilthird2021 5 hours ago

        Only the military wing of Hezbollah is considered a terrorist group by the EU, so a Hungarian company could legally sell them equipment provided it was to the political or social arms of the organization (how they determine this with an obviously fluid org like that I'll never know).

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    • dqv 2 days ago

      This stunt is great for Boycott/Divestment/Sanctions folks though. Here in the US, many states require fealty to Israel in the form of promising you won’t boycott them if you want to do business with that state’s government. Now there’s an easy out: no one is boycotting Israel, they’re just avoiding the liability of Mossad intercepting and tampering with a shipment.

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      • nebula8804 2 days ago

        Would that even hold up in court? Would be amazing at counteracting these unconstitutional laws. The biggest problem is that these laws are much easier to get passed then to get repealed. Because each repeal requires a long winded lawsuit that can sometime only get the law slightly altered.

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        • aprilthird2021 5 hours ago

          It would not hold up in court because the requirement to not boycott Israel is stronger for businesses than it is for individuals who want to contract with the state government.

          There is a federal Office of Anti boycott Compliance that any employee of any company can tip off and have the company punished if it's believed they did not give a fair shake to an Israeli supplier or bidder of any kind.

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    • ExoticPearTree a day ago

      Well, pagers are not military products. And second, except for ordnance, you don't need any license to manufacture any product.

      For products that can have dual-use capabilities, you need an export license that is given per customer (at least in the EU) where some due diligence is performed. If the company is a reseller in Lebanon and there are no export bans for that country, they can be sold/bought without an issue.

      The fact that somewhere in transit they were modified, the manufacturer or seller cannot be held liable for it.

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    • kranke155 2 days ago

      They will fold. It’s Israel and Germany and France will push the EU to memory hole this.

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  • steventhedev 2 days ago

    Doesn't matter. Hezbollah are subject to sanctions by the EU as a designated terrorist organization. Presumably, that applies to all companies operating within the EU.

    Sanctions violations are very much a "do not pass go" style crime, and this looks like it was an entire batch that was delivered directly to Hezbollah.

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  • RHSeeger 2 days ago

    > Were the pagers military grade

    I don't mean to be "that guy", but "military grade" means nothing nowadays. It can mean anything from "made to exactly standards" to "made by the lowest bidder, and likely to fail the minute it's used".

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    • verulito 2 days ago

      Been a while since I did fmeca work but it used to mean different tolerances for the parts.

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    • [removed] 2 days ago
      [deleted]
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    • pvaldes 2 days ago

      A type of people that uses pagers all day is Physicians. Hospital staff.

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    • red-iron-pine 2 days ago

      "military grade means 'from the lowest bidder', but can tolerate being a dropped a few times"

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  • stef25 2 days ago

    Just normal pagers with 20g of high explosive inserted in to them. They found a way of remotely getting the battery to overheat with would make the thing go boom.

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onemoresoop 2 days ago

> If Gold Apollo wants to keep selling pagers, better they start making all the carcasses on their products transparent from now on. With a big photo in the boxes showing how the correct product must look.

I don't think that would make a difference at all, explosives could be disguised in any electronic components, being transparent wouldn't help very much. The Taiwanese company's brand is now irreparably tarnished, I think that is the cost of lending the brand name to an untrustworthy partner.

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adityaathalyo 2 days ago

> This was a direct attack to their survival as company. Will they sue Israeli government for turning their product into a bomb used to mutilate and kill people? Seems not probable.

Would Toyota or any other car manufacturer sue Arabs et al. for turning their pickups into rolling suicide bombs?

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  • pvaldes 2 days ago

    Toyota will definitely sue to death somebody --selling-- thousands of new Toyotas modified in mass to kill their drivers. If not, they would be sued massively instead, so is not something that they could just let pass.

    If the owner wants later to trow their Toyota over a cliff is a different problem and not Toyota's business.

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chx 2 days ago

As it can be expected the situation is extremely murky. Hungarian press is abuzz with this, I will translate a few hard facts and leave speculation to others. I will also use English sources as appropriate. Hungarian sources are below the list, you can run them through automated translation to fact check me.

* There's a small consulting company called BAC after the initials of the founder Bársony-Arcidiacono Cristiana. One of their services is https://archive.fo/kwTKA "We develop international technology cooperation among countries for the sale of telecommunication products. This cooperation entails scaling up a business from Asia to new markets e.g. developing countries". Their home page https://archive.fo/dXtMx lists these: Strategic Advisor for major International Organizations including Financial companies (Venture Capitals, IAEA, UNESCO, CNRS, EC, etc.). Business Developer and Savvy Analyst for Innovative/ Solutions in diverse fields (Sustainable Development (SDGs), Water, Energy, Resilience-Mitigation-Adaptation, Capacity Building, Complex Emergencies, Digitalization (AI, Blockchain, ICT) within Humanistic Economy.

* The official place of business is just a business "placeholder". The woman who answered the doorbell for journalists said no one ever from BAC is there, maybe once a month a mail comes which she receives.

* This house is also the registered address for a number of companies. Two companies have Russian owners. One of them is an oil wholesaler.

* BAC revenue in 2023 was 210 million forints and 13 million profit. What's remarkable is how person-related expenses (payroll etc) was a mere 0.5 million forints for the entire year. Hungarian monthly minimum wage was a bit over 0.25M HUF. One million HUF is about 2820 USD.

* NBC talked to the founder. According to her "I don’t make the pagers. I am just the intermediate. I think you got it wrong". https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taiwan-firm-denies-making...

* The founder's linkedin is still up https://www.linkedin.com/in/cristiana-b%C3%A0rsony-arcidiaco... Her PhD from 2006 is at https://ucl.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/fulldisplay?do... so it seems real.

https://hvg.hu/kkv/20240918_hezbollah-bac-consulting

https://archive.is/QWlXw

https://telex.hu/belfold/2024/09/18/mit-lehet-tudni-a-magyar...

In conclusion, if I needed to speculate based on the LinkedIn page and the archived consulting page, what gives me pause: if this woman indeed exists she is one of the most talented people in all of Hungary. Seven languages, degrees in diverse fields and a PhD in physics. At the same time, I have indeed found a PhD from 2006 and her grants and scholarships from even earlier are probably not hard to verify either. I do not know what to think.

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  • weweersdfsd 2 days ago

    To me the content archived consulting page looks very much like something a large language model would generate. Impressive, but doesn't make any sense considering the size of this company. Probably good enough to fool Hezbollah anyway.

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    • chx 2 days ago

      She purportedly got a PhD in London, UK. Now I do not speak English that well but to me this sentence "This cooperation entails scaling up a business from Asia to new markets e.g. developing countries" does not look correct. Is it...?

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      • Reubend a day ago

        It's grammatically correct, but it's very awkward. Most people would say "We partner with technology companies to introduce their products to new markets in developing countries".

        As it's written, it only mentions "a business" (singular) when it likely means multiple businesses. It also uses the word cooperation, which has different connotations than a partnership. Typically, business will say that they "cooperate" with governments, standards bodies, or trade restrictions. For friendly and mutually profitable agreements, they'll use the word "partner" to indicate that both parties benefit.

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  • anonu 2 days ago

    https://web.archive.org/web/20240401000000*/www.bacconsultin...

    The timeline of web archive snapshots is strange. No real change or activity for years - then a flurry of changes in 2024.

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  • bloopernova 2 days ago

    And now there's a second set of explosions, this time using handheld radios.

    I'm hopeful that this won't escalate, but I'm very anxious that it will.

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FridayoLeary 2 days ago

I doubt the company exists anymore or that there's anyone left in hungary who can be held responsible. Here's what i imagine took place:

step one: mossad sets up some sham manufacturing facility in Hungary or buys an existing one.

Step 2: reach out to gold apollo and make a deal to produce their pagers under license. Money no object they probably offered them very good terms. Gold apollo is so pleased by the money being offered they fail to investigate the company properly. Step 3: mossad agents start production introducing lethal batteries into the design, produce several thousand units then vanish leaving apollo executives bewildered but they have the money already so they don't ask too many questions.

Step 4: sell all the pagers at a great price to some hezbolla arms dealer, go home, buy some popcorn and turn on the tv.

In short everyone involved have probably disappeared months ago.

Also a really clever part is that they could have turned a profit on the sale meaning the operation was at least partly subsidised by hezbolla themselves.

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  • d1sxeyes 2 days ago

    There are lots of companies with questionable practices in Hungary. One scam I am aware of is companies that are registered in the names of homeless people whose sole function is to churn out receipts that other companies buy at fractions of their face value in order to run “clean” expenses through their books and effectively launder money.

    Would not surprise me if this turned out to be something like that.

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    • FridayoLeary 2 days ago

      Its not just Hungary. There's a famous high street in London with a series of sweet shops (about 2 dozen) that are a very obvious front for a money laundering scheme. Allegedly the taliban or some other afghan crime ring).

      I don't know why the authorities are ignoring them but it's probably such a big can of worms that everyones afraid to open it.

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      • d1sxeyes 2 days ago

        Gummy worms?

        In all seriousness though, those “sweet shops” and “Thai massage parlours” and the like are clearly fronts for money laundering. I doubt they’re being ignored, but as you say, there’s probably some reason no one’s dealt with them yet.

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refurb 2 days ago

Can a company sue you because you modified their product? Even if that modification caused harm?

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  • remram 2 days ago

    Am intermediary can be sued just for damaging products through insufficient, they can certainly be sued for adding defects on purpose. Especially lethal defects.

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    • echoangle 2 days ago

      But can the manufacturer sue? Isn’t the normal way that the customer sues, because their stuff was damaged? Can the manufacturer sue me if I buy their stuff, modify it to be deadly, and sell it again?

      (I don’t mean “can the sue me” but “do they have any chance of winning” of course)

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      • pvaldes 2 days ago

        > But can the manufacturer sue? do they have any chance of winning?

        For Gold Apollo the dilemma here is either to sue the Israel Government (and try to survive the experience as company), or to take the piss and be sued for the families of the people mutilated by "their" product. They are in a difficult position.

        It depends on how deep are their pockets and what they think will do less damage to the brand. Also if it has Taiwanese government support or not (unlikely as they probably depend on Israel technology for defense); and if Taiwan companies team with them or not. If the "made in Taiwan" sector want to keep selling radios and pagers to the rest of the planet they need to assure that this can't happen again.

        I assume that the consequences for Israel will be indirect, limited and approved by USA, or none.

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        • pvaldes 2 days ago

          Update: Gold Apollo is a small company with about 30 employees. The CEO said that this was humiliating, the products were made by a distributor in Hungary and that they were ruined for that. Small chances that they could sue anybody.

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      • remram 2 days ago

        If you pretend it's legit, I'd say you're breaking trademark law, even if it isn't explosive. The same way you can't put old laptops in Macbook cases and open an online shop.

        In this case there would also be a contract with specific terms for the reseller/manufacturer that certainly includes language such as "purposefully produce devices that would damage the brand".

        Of course I think the customers have a more serious case to bring on (particularly ones that weren't terrorists). As well as war crime considerations.

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TiredOfLife 2 days ago

[flagged]

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  • fodkodrasz 2 days ago

    You are right in tha aspect that terrorism doesn't care about excuses (at least externally, it needs to justify its actions to its "follower base" though).

    I have an intuition that the grandparent tried to express someting like:

    Now Hezbollah has a motivation to attack Hungarian interest in the EU.

    Which I'd simplify as something more concerning for me, as a Hungarian: Now Hazbollah has motivation to attack Hungarians.

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  • aenopix 2 days ago

    Israel is the terrorist here

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    • trallnag 2 days ago

      Please keep the conversation somewhat technology related. Seething about Israel making a dunk on Hisbollah is more suited for Reddit or similar.

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      • greentxt 2 days ago

        Good reminder about avoiding low quality posting but also we aren't supposed to compare hn posts to reddit. I've done that too, and been reminded not to.

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    • FridayoLeary 2 days ago

      Its called war. Traditionally militaries have always despised spies but the results speak for themselves. No standard operation could ever have been so discriminatory or so effectively minimised the risk of collateral damage. Nor could they have disabled so many enemy soldiers so cheaply and most importantly of all, without putting a single troop at risk.

      So nasty but effective. I think Israel should at least get some credit for minimising the risk of innocent bystanders getting injured. They could have made a bigger bomb.

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      • skyyler 2 days ago

        Didn't a child die in these explosions?

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        • FridayoLeary 2 days ago

          That doesn't invalidate any of my points. A 10:1 ratio of militant to civilian deaths would be impossible to acheive using any conventional method. Unless you are arguing the acceptable number of civilian deaths in war is zero i'm not sure of the point you are trying to make.

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  • desdenova 2 days ago

    The terrorists didn't need an excuse to put bombs in pagers. The person you were responding was talking about the Hezbollah, though.

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    • dijit 2 days ago

      [flagged]

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      • gghhzzgghhzz 2 days ago

        "EU and the Arab League"

        EU does not classify Hezbollah as a terror organisation, only its military wing.

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        • dijit 2 days ago

          Who was attacked?

          My understanding was that it was exclusively military leaders and that the pagers were handed out specifically to combat Israeli surveillance.

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      • umanwizard 2 days ago

        > Hezbollah are classified as a terror organisation by the UN

        That is not true. Lots of countries and organizations consider them a terrorist organization, but the UN isn’t one of them.

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AtlasBarfed 2 days ago

Hezbollah and Hamas need the inherent anti Israel bias of Europe. It's the only international group with money and influence that sides with them. If they attack anything in Israel then it is a massive Israeli win.

Europe only care for geopolitical games in the Mediterranean and petroleum. The Gaza conflict has shown that oil is on its way out as a top level geopolitical influence.

Lol military grade. This is a guerilla fighting group getting leftover oil money from Iran. They were using pagers.

Israel has been fighting for 100 years with its hands tied. With the unofficial and largely official sunni/saudi Israel alliance, only Iran cares about the freedom fighters of Gaza and Lebanon, and you can put a ten year clock on that funding once EVs start taking real chunks of transport

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