A week after thousands of beepers and walkie-talkies were detonated targeting Hezbollah members in Lebanon, how these devices were booby-trapped and placed in the hands of the Shiite militia remains shrouded in mystery.
Apart from the death toll – 39 dead, including two children, and more than 3,000 wounded – one thing is certain: It took meticulous organization and logistics, coupled with absolute discretion, to carry out this unprecedented operation. Although Israel has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement, there is little doubt that it is responsible. According to the New York Times, citing sources within the Israeli intelligence services, three front companies were used to fool Hezbollah into letting their guard down.
The first is a Hungarian consultancy founded in 2022, BAC Consulting. On Tuesday, September 17, in the minutes following the first explosions, images of pager debris circulated on social media. One logo was clearly visible: That of the Taiwanese company Gold Apollo. The company's CEO, Hsu Ching-Kuang, was quick to distance himself. He explained that he sold BAC Consulting the right to use his logo and that the Hungarian company was responsible for "producing and selling" the pagers. He has not, however, explained why the exact model that exploded in the streets of Lebanon appeared on his website. On Thursday, the executive was questioned by the Taiwanese public prosecutor's office, along with Teresa Wu, an employee of a company suspected of having acted as an intermediary between BAC Consulting and Gold Apollo. The pager bombs "were not manufactured in Taiwan," said the Taiwanese economy minister the following day.
The idea that the bombs were manufactured in Hungary was also quickly discredited. Reporters rushing to BAC Consulting's address came across a small beige building a few kilometers from the center of Budapest, where the company has no office, only a mailbox. The CV of its CEO, founder and probably only employee, Cristiana Barsony-Arcidiacono, is breathtaking. She speaks seven languages, has a PhD in particle physics and studied at the prestigious London School of Economics. She is also proud to have worked with the European Commission, French National Center for Scientific Research and UNESCO, and to have advised companies all over the world.
But some of the entries on this impressive CV have been significantly embellished, according to the Reuters news agency. On her lengthy LinkedIn profile, since deleted, she claims that her "diverse experience" enables her "to lead far-reaching and complex environmental, political and development programs." On the BAC Consulting website, no details can be found about her work.
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