We still don’t know how the Lebanon pager attack happened. Here’s what we do know about our own electronic devices

So far, the attacks that targeted Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah members through their pagers have had devastating consequences. At least nine people, including an eight-year-old girl, were killed, and at least 2,800 were wounded. Over 150 of those injured are in critical condition, according to the Lebanese health minister.

So far, the attacks that targeted Iran-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah members through their pagers have had devastating consequences. At least nine people, including an eight-year-old girl, were killed, and around 2,800 were wounded. Over 150 of those injured are in critical condition, according to the Lebanese health minister. It’s important to note that the exact cause of the explosions hasn’t been confirmed yet, and the news is developing by the minute. So far, experts who spoke to CNN said the explosions were most likely triggered by hardware tampering rather than another theory of a cybersecurity breach causing lithium batteries to heat up and explode – but neither has been confirmed by authorities. In short, your communications device is not at risk for exploding unless it’s heavily tampered with and laced with explosives, experts who spoke to CNN said. The explosions came as Israel and Hezbollah have engaged in tit-for-tat strikes for months in the wake of the Israel-Hamas war. The Israel Defense Forces had no comment on Tuesday, though Hezbollah and the Lebanese government blamed Israel. Pagers are wireless devices that can send messages without an internet connection. Though they’ve lost popularity to cell phones, some fields like healthcare still depend on them. Justin Cappos, a cybersecurity professor at NYU, said that it’s possible to cause damage to a variety of batteries – most commonly lithium batteries, which have caused dangerous fires. But he said it seems like the “devices were intentionally designed to explode when triggered, not a pager that everyone else in the world is using.”