HSBC aims to shift $20 billion worth of assets to a new blockchain-based custody platform by March, in one of the biggest deployments yet of the widely-hyped but still unproven technology by a global bank. From a report: The platform, known as Digital Vault, will give investors real-time access to records of securities bought on private markets, HSBC told Reuters, and seeks to capitalize on booming interest in such investments by yield-hungry investors. Banks and other financial firms have invested billions of dollars into finding uses for blockchain, a digital ledger that can be instantly and transparently updated. Few, however, have come up with practical or widely-used applications. Proponents say the blockchain will upend the financial sector by cutting out costly processes or the need for middlemen - though there have been few solid examples yet of such revolutionary use. The HSBC platform will digitize paper-based records of private placements, using blockchain to reduce the time it takes investors to make checks or queries on holdings.

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I am what you might think of as a white Russian. My grandparents on my father's side came from the eastern side of the Urals. But I was born in the US of A. Maybe that's why the favored drink for the night after Thanksgiving is a White Russian, which also happens to be the favorite drink of Jeff Lebowski.

So, while turkey soup is simmering...

A very easy drink to make, and love.

1. Ice cubes.
2. Kahlua.
3. Vodka.
4. Heavy cream.

Sip.

Yum.

A standard used by phone carriers around the world can leave users open to all sorts of attacks, like text message and call interception, spoofed phone numbers, and leaking their coarse location, new research reveals. From a report: The Rich Communication Services (RCS) standard is essentially the replacement for SMS. The news shows how even as carriers move onto more modern protocols for communication, phone network security continues to be an exposed area with multiple avenues for attack in some implementations of RCS. "I'm surprised that large companies, like Vodafone, introduce a technology that exposes literally hundreds of millions of people, without asking them, without telling them," Karsten Nohl from cybersecurity firm Security Research Labs (SRLabs) told Motherboard in a phone call. SRLabs researchers Luca Melette and Sina Yazdanmehr will present their RCS findings at the upcoming Black Hat Europe conference in December, and discussed some of their work at security conference DeepSec on Friday. RCS is a relatively new standard for carrier messaging and includes more features than SMS, such as photos, group chats, and file transfers. Back in 2015, Google announced it would be adopting RCS to move users away from SMS, and that it had acquired a company called Jibe Mobile to help with the transition. RCS essentially runs as an app on your phone that logs into a service with a username and password, Nohl explained.

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At least seven people reported to have been shot dead, officials said, hours after PM's announcement to step down.

Opposition representatives blame government delegation for failure of talks to amend the Syrian constitution.

Reports say Qatar FM met senior Saudi officials in the capital during a visit last month.

Police said in a tweet that the incident happened on the city’s main shopping street.

As shopping takes off for the holiday season, so do phony reviews -- and pressure is mounting on major retailers to fight back. From a report: More than a third of online reviews on major websites, including those on Amazon.com, Walmart and Sephora, are fake, meaning they are generated by robots or people paid to write them, according to Fakespot, which identifies fraudulent reviews. The problem has become so pervasive that the Federal Trade Commission has started cracking down on violators, and lawmakers are pressing Amazon to do a better job of policing reviews on its website. This month Apple Inc. pulled all product reviews and ratings from its online store without explanation. Amazon, Walmart and Sephora dispute Fakespot's findings but say they are taking steps to make their reviews more reliable. In Amazon's case, it said it has spent more than $400 million to protect customers from review abuse and other fraud or misconduct in the past year, and that it prevented more than 13 million attempts last year to leave inauthentic reviews on its website. Further reading: When Is a Star Not Always a Star? When It's an Online Review.

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The French President has reiterated his remarks on NATO and argues terrorism is now the enemy, not Russia.

Reports come as Joseph Muscat faces pressure over government's alleged cover-up of murder of a journalist two years ago.

Geoffrey S. Berman, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, John C. Demers, the Assistant Attorney General for National Security, John Brown, Assistant Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation Counterintelligence Division, and William F. Sweeney Jr., the Assistant Director-in-Charge of the New York Field Office of the FBI, announced today the unsealing of a criminal complaint charging VIRGIL GRIFFITH, a United States citizen who works for Ethereum, with violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act by traveling to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK or North Korea) in order deliver a presentation and technical advice on using cryptocurrency and blockchain technology to evade sanctions. From a press release: GRIFFITH was arrested at Los Angeles International Airport yesterday and will be presented in federal court in Los Angeles later today. U.S. Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman stated: "As alleged, Virgil Griffith provided highly technical information to North Korea, knowing that this information could be used to help North Korea launder money and evade sanctions. In allegedly doing so, Griffith jeopardized the sanctions that both Congress and the president have enacted to place maximum pressure on North Korea's dangerous regime." Assistant Attorney General John Demers said: "Despite receiving warnings not to go, Griffith allegedly traveled to one of the United States' foremost adversaries, North Korea, where he taught his audience how to use blockchain technology to evade sanctions. By this complaint, we begin the process of seeking justice for such conduct."

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Intel sold its smartphone modem chip business to Apple at "a multi-billion dollar loss," the U.S. chipmaker said in a court filing on Friday, alleging that rival Qualcomm forced it out of the market. From a report: Intel made the claims in a brief filed with the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, where Qualcomm is seeking to overturn a sweeping antitrust decision against it after losing a lawsuit by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. Intel, whose executives testified at the trial, argued on Friday that the ruling should stand. Appeal proceedings are expected to begin in January. In a 233-page decision issued in May, U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose wrote that Qualcomm's patent licensing practices "strangled competition" in parts of the market for modem chips that connect smartphones to mobile data networks. She ordered the San Diego-based company to renegotiate licensing agreements at reasonable prices.

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The US president has said he wants to designate Latin American cartels as 'terrorist organisations'.

Paul Sawers, writing for VentureBeat: WhatsApp launched out of beta 10 years ago this month, and the messaging behemoth is now a completely different beast from the one that quietly arrived for iPhone users way back in November 2009. After Facebook shelled out around $20 billion to acquire the app in 2014, WhatsApp introduced voice calls, video calls, group calls, web and desktop apps, end-to-end encryption, and fingperprint unlocking. All the while, Facebook has been figuring out how to monetize its gargantuan acquisition by targeting businesses. However, there remains one glaring chink in WhatsApp's otherwise expansive armor -- namely, the lack of simultaneous multi-device support. Things could be about to change, however. Given that WhatsApp is tethered to a user's mobile number and all messages are stored locally on devices, rather than on remote servers, syncing and accessing WhatsApp across devices poses something of a challenge. WhatsApp Web allows users to message from their desktop computer, but by essentially mirroring their mobile device -- one can't work without the other. Moreover, WhatsApp Web lacks many of the features of the mobile app, such as voice and video calling. Achieving true multi-device support -- without compromising security -- would be a big game changer for WhatsApp.

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Fahd al-Astal, 16, died after being shot in stomach east of Khan Younis in southern Gaza, ministry of health said.