edit: after 20 comments, i’m adding a post description here, since most of the commenters so far appear not to be reading the article:

This is about how surprisingly cheap it is (eg $15,000) to buy a complete production line to be able to manufacture batteries with a layer of nearly-undetectable explosives inside of them, which can be triggered by off-the-shelf devices with only their firmware modified.

screenshot of paragraph from the article saying "The process to build such batteries is well understood and documented. Here is an excerpt from one vendor’s site promising to sell the equipment to build batteries in limited quantities (tens-to-hundreds per batch) for as little as $15,000:" followed by a screenshot of "Flow-chart of Pouch Cell Lab-scale Fabrication" showing a 20 step process

  • FarceOfWill@infosec.pub
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    1 month ago

    Jfc Christ Lemmy.

    Every single comment misunderstanding the point. The batteries are exploding because there’s explosives in them. This does make them exploding batteries. They explode because they are partially made with explosives. Please don’t “well actually” this.

    No this is not a description of something Israel did, it’s a hypothetical way to do a similar attack to show how within reach of idiot terrorists it is.

    Raising the idea of doing this so everyone is thinking about it is extremely bad for us all. Thanks Israel.

    • db2@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      Please don’t well actually this.

      Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?

    • femtech@midwest.social
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      1 month ago

      That does not make them exploding batteries, it had explosives in them. A suicide bomber is not an explosive human.

      • ripcord@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        They’re batteries. And they are explosive because of the explosives in them. They are discrete things that are explosives.

        You’re trying to make a weird, un-useful, pedantic distinction here.

        Comment you replied to was making a far more useful correction, because people did not read the article.

    • NeoNachtwaechter@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      Jfc Christ Lemmy.Every single comment misunderstanding the point.

      Pedantics fighting pedantics LOL

      The batteries are exploding because there’s explosives in them. This does make them exploding batteries.

      And when you put the same explosives inside a barbie doll and make it go off, then it wasn’t an exploding barbie doll. Or was it? ;-)

    • Tikiporch@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      I think there may be a couple edits needed in your comment. Reread slowly and get back to us.

  • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    It’s also a big ass war crime. And if you did it habitually as anyone other than the West you could expect a visit from the US military. Inside the West you’d likely end up in prison. Except Israel. Israel is just immune to everything because uhhh… Because… Well nobody actually has a good reason.

    • MrScottyTay@sh.itjust.works
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      1 month ago

      Because people are scared to be seen as an anti-Semite if you are critical of a Jewish state and their wrongdoings.

      This is how Jeremy Corbyn got slammed as being an anti-Semite across the media and eventually kicked out of the labour party.

  • RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Even though your edit clarified it, I wish we’d stop calling them “exploding batteries”. The battery isn’t the explosive, it’s the explosives that were hidden in the device. I’ve already encountered far too many morons describing conspiracies where the big bad government could make your iPhone explode.

      • Crashumbc@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        That’s like saying exploding cars when you’re really talking about a bomb placed in a car…

        • surewhynotlem@lemmy.world
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          1 month ago

          “A bomb going 80 mph on the highway exploded.”

          Doesn’t give the right information.

          And if we’re being pedantic, when a bomb explodes, so does everything around it. Exploding doesn’t require a chemical reaction. It’s the act of tearing apart quickly. So yes, the car exploded.

          That’s in English though. Other languages may be different.

  • Ilovethebomb@lemm.ee
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    1 month ago

    Just to be clear, the pager thing wasn’t exploding batteries, they had apparently been modified at the production level to have explosives in them, which could be triggered by the pager system itself.

      • breadsmasher@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        Did you read it?

        The article literally talks about inserting an explosive layer inside the battery at production. Just like the comment said.

        It isn’t “any batteries can explode”.

        Reports indicate the explosive payload in the cells is made of PETN.

        Such a sheet could be inserted into the battery fold-and-stack process, after the first fold is made (or, with some effort, perhaps PETN could be incorporated into the spacer polymer itself – but let’s assume for now it’s just a drop-in sheet, which is easy to execute and likely effective)

        • Arthur Besse@lemmy.mlOP
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          1 month ago

          Just to be clear, the pager thing wasn’t exploding batteries, they had apparently been modified at the production level to have explosives in them, which could be triggered by the pager system itself.

          What? 🤦 The comment I replied to said:

          Just to be clear, the pager thing wasn’t exploding batteries, they had apparently been modified at the production level to have explosives in them, which could be triggered by the pager system itself.

          It seems clear that “they had apparently been modified at the production level” is referring to the pagers, rather than their batteries. But the article is explaining how it could have been that the batteries were the part of the pager that had the explosives (in which case it was the battery that was exploding).

          • breadsmasher@lemmy.world
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            1 month ago

            You are inferring what someone meant, and then applying some super pedantic reasoning.

            When manufacturing pagers, that includes the pager electronics, the case, and the battery.

            Wasn’t exploding batteries

            The batteries themselves unmodified, standard batteries were not somehow hacked to explode. At some point in the manufacturing of the pagers which includes the battery, explosives were included.

            • Arthur Besse@lemmy.mlOP
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              1 month ago

              You are inferring what someone meant, and then applying some super pedantic reasoning.

              I think I am inferring correctly, especially since the person you’re talking about replied “of course not” to my question about if they read the article.

  • ashar@infosec.pub
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    1 month ago

    Sending out IEDs that will probably explode in a supermarket and kill civilians is generally considered a war crime. So far 2 kids killed in Beirut by the Israeli bombs in devices.

    • roofuskit@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      Exterminating the next generation of people who would live on the land they want to steal is the goal.

  • ryathal@sh.itjust.works
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    1 month ago

    We don’t see exploding batteries more because most militaries are better about securing their supply chain.

    • geneva_convenience@lemmy.ml
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      1 month ago

      The attack hit many civilians. For militaires it might be feasible to secure their chain. For terror attacks, which this was, it would be far more difficult.

    • SoJB@lemmy.ml
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      1 month ago

      Really glad to hear the dead 8 year old girl was Khamas. I’m sure the dozen children that will be shot in the head today will be relieved once they find out they were Khamas as well and deserved to be shot in the head.

  • SlopppyEngineer@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    Lithium burns intensely but it doesn’t explode. An electric car can burn for a long time, but they don’t explode. One of the comments says so

    I understand that what happened in Libanon was that dedicated explosives were added to the devices, it was not the batteries exploding. But that does not take away the conclusion of your story.

    It shouldn’t be undetectable. Throw a device from s series into a fire as a spot check and if it burns it’s ok, if it explodes give the entire series to your enemy’s kids to play with.

  • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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    1 month ago

    And also because it’s impossible.

    So it is actually in fact very hard. What they had was exploding explosives which are not hard.

    • Arthur Besse@lemmy.mlOP
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      1 month ago

      Since apparently many people aren’t reading the article: It is about how cheap it actually is (eg $15,000) to buy a complete production line to be able to manufacture batteries with a layer of nearly-undetectable explosives inside of them, which can be triggered by off-the-shelf devices with only their firmware modified.

      screenshot of paragraph from the article saying "The process to build such batteries is well understood and documented. Here is an excerpt from one vendor’s site promising to sell the equipment to build batteries in limited quantities (tens-to-hundreds per batch) for as little as $15,000:" followed by a screenshot of "Flow-chart of Pouch Cell Lab-scale Fabrication" showing a 20 step process

  • Blackmist@feddit.uk
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    1 month ago

    It’s not just the batteries, you need a way to blow them up remotely and reliably.

    This wasn’t just some wonky batteries shoved into legit devices. This was an entire operation to make fake pagers and walkie talkies. The batteries were probably the only legit things in them.

    Fortunately these are simple devices that you can probably replicate the guts of with a few dollars of off the shelf parts. You’re not going to be able to fake an iPhone like this. Cheaper to just drop bombs at that point. And tbh, if it was something expensive like an iPhone, Hezbollah wouldn’t have bought a thousand of them.