The pagers, deemed by Hezbollah to be safer than cellphones, were probably rigged with explosives before they were delivered to Lebanon, experts said.

Gold Apollo, a wireless communications device manufacturer in Taiwan, said it did not make the pagers used in the Lebanon explosion attack.

The AR-924 pager, advertised as "rugged," contains a rechargeable lithium battery and could receive texts of up to 100 characters. It also claimed to have up to 85 days of battery life, crucial in Lebanon, where electricity outages are commonplace following years of economic collapse.