peaceful-jp-scenery posted a photo:

Aizu Festival
会津まつり・藩公行列

People are gathering one after another in the plaza of Tsuruga Castle. This is the time when Tsuruga Castle is at its most magnificent.

鶴ヶ城の広場に続々と集結。鶴ヶ城が一番華やかになる時です。

[16:9 trimming]
Aizuwakamatsu city, Fukushima pref, Japan

peaceful-jp-scenery posted a photo:

Aizu Festival
会津まつり・出陣号砲

This is the signal to march out. Boom!!
出陣の号砲です。ズドーン！！

[16:9 trimming]
Aizuwakamatsu city, Fukushima pref, Japan

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

HSBC has blocked its Android app from running inside Samsung Secure Folder and Android Private Space without warning, leaving some customers unable to access online banking. The Register asked HSBC to explain the change. It said the block was "a proportionate security control designed to mitigate a foreseeable security risk. It does not prevent customers from accessing the HSBC UK Mobile Banking app – customers simply need to access our app outside of the virtual space environment." When we asked why, HSBC said: "For security reasons, our mobile banking app cannot be used within certain protected private space and virtual space tools, which could prevent or limit the identification of certain threats, or from sending timely fraud notifications." One reader who installed the app in Samsung Secure Folder said they received no advance warning and felt "held hostage from my own account." The app now displays a generic message about a security problem with the device and offers only the option to quit. Samsung Secure Folder uses the company's Knox platform to isolate and encrypt apps and data behind separate authentication. Android's Private Space, introduced with Android 15, similarly places selected apps in a separate profile that can be hidden and locked. Our tipster said the block also prevented them from using web banking because HSBC required the app for multifactor authentication. They said no alternative access method had been arranged before the change. Reviews on Google Play describe similar experiences. One Android user said the app had stopped launching from Samsung Secure Folder because HSBC deemed it "an unsecured virtual environment." The reviewer called the decision particularly baffling because they had put the banking app there for additional protection. Another reviewer said they had been cut off from their account after the app stopped opening in Secure Folder. They claimed they could not activate another installation outside it because doing so required a code from the inaccessible copy. Responding on the Google Play reviews page, HSBC asked both reviewers to contact it privately. Customers acknowledged that the bank may be trying to mitigate a security risk, but questioned why it did not warn them before removing support. One argued on Reddit that the lack of warning may conflict with HSBC's obligations under the FCA's Consumer Duty. FCA guidance says banks should help customers understand changes through communications sent in advance and have processes for technical problems that prevent account access. They added that the "change was introduced without warning. A setup that had been working simply stopped working, leaving me unable to use the personal banking app." The poster said HSBC's app team told them Secure Folder could limit the app's ability to detect threats and interfere with fraud notifications. They countered that blocking the app entirely also deprives affected customers of those notifications and the ability to respond through the app. Another said: "I called to complain and was told this is an intentional policy change and I need to store it in the regular part of my phone as they consider this to be more secure. "No advance communication of the change, and the policy seems mad to me. Downside for me is that if I refuse to install in the regular part of my phone I cannot access my online banking via a desktop for 5-10 working days whilst they send me an authentication token. So essentially I'm locked out of banking for 5-10 days." Our tipster said HSBC's help pages and chatbots contained no information about the change, while branch staff could not explain it and telephone support repeated that the device had a security problem. When we asked HSBC about how it planned to notify customers, an UK spokesperson told us: "Customers who try to access our app with private space and virtual space tools are informed that to help protect their accounts, they will not be able to access the HSBC UK mobile banking app within private space and virtual space tools." This is not the first time HSBC's mobile security checks have locked out customers. Earlier this year, the app flagged sideloaded installations of Bitwarden as a potential risk. F-Droid board member Neil Brown said HSBC locked him out of its app after it detected a copy of Bitwarden installed from the open source app catalog rather than Google Play. HSBC said at the time: "Protecting our customers' accounts and personal information is our priority. Our app performs checks to identify potential malware risks and can require users to take additional steps to keep their accounts safe." In that case, the user was told access would be restored if they removed the sideloaded app. Customers affected by the latest block say their choices are to install HSBC's app in the main phone profile, which isn't possible for some customers without an authentication code from the old one, or wait five to ten working days for another authentication method to access desktop/web banking. It is possible to use a Physical Secure Key, or PSK, to access desktop banking, but if the customer does not already have this, it could take several days to reach them. When we asked about this, an HSBC UK spokesperson told us: "Customers simply need to open the HSBC UK Mobile Banking app outside of the Samsung Secure Folder. Customers that are unable to use the app can use a PSK to access desktop Online Banking." Samsung describes Secure Folder as an encrypted, Knox-protected space, while Google says Private Space isolates selected apps in a separate Android profile. That isolation may also restrict the security information available to apps running inside them. The Register has contacted Google and Samsung for comment. ®

MOSKOU (ANP/RTR) - Rusland heeft de Noord-Koreaanse leider Kim Jong-un een officiële uitnodiging gestuurd om Rusland te komen bezoeken. Dat meldt de Russische onderminister van Buitenlandse Zaken tegen het staatspersbureau TASS.

De relatie tussen de twee landen is de afgelopen jaren versterkt. Rusland en Noord-Korea tekenden een verdedigingsovereenkomst, waarmee ze hun militaire samenwerking hebben opgeschroefd. Sinds 2024 stuurt Noord-Korea militairen om Rusland te helpen in de oorlog met Oekraïne.

OSLO (ANP/AFP/BLOOMBERG) - De Noorse centrale bank heeft donderdag de rente voor de tweede keer dit jaar verhoogd om de inflatie in het land te bestrijden. Volgens de Norges Bank zijn verdere verhogingen mogelijk nodig om de stijging van de consumentenprijzen onder controle te krijgen.

De Noorse centrale bank was in mei al de eerste centrale bank in Europa die de rente verhoogde sinds het begin van de oorlog in het Midden-Oosten. De rente ging nu opnieuw met een kwart procentpunt omhoog naar 4,5 procent.

Andere centrale banken, zoals de ECB en de Amerikaanse Fed, hebben het voorbeeld van de Norges Bank inmiddels gevolgd. De ECB verhoogde in juni de rente voor het eerst dit jaar, gevolgd door een tweede verhoging in september. De Fed verhoogde deze maand de rente voor het eerst dit jaar om de inflatie te beteugelen, die wordt veroorzaakt door een sterke stijging van de energiekosten door de Iranoorlog.

De centrale banken van Zwitserland en Zweden hielden donderdag hun rentetarieven wel ongewijzigd.

DIEMEN (ANP) - De vraag naar starters en junioren op de Nederlandse arbeidsmarkt neemt bovengemiddeld af, signaleert uitzendbureau Randstad. Hoewel die afname door sommigen aan de opkomst van kunstmatige intelligentie (AI) wordt toegeschreven, heeft dit meer te maken met schommelingen in de economie, zei arbeidsmarktanalist Bart van Krimpen van Randstad tijdens een onlinepresentatie.

Momenteel ligt het aantal vacatures voor starters ruim 30 procent onder het niveau van 2022, toen de krapte een piek bereikte. De vraag naar jonge werkenden daalt sinds het piekjaar harder dan bijvoorbeeld de vraag naar arbeidskrachten in medior- of seniorfuncties.

Hoewel AI steeds zichtbaarder wordt op de arbeidsmarkt, is het volgens Van Krimpen "veel te kort door de bocht" dat de technologie tot een massale afname van startersbanen leidt. Aannemelijker is volgens Randstad dat afkoeling op de arbeidsmarkt het eerst zichtbaar is onder jongeren. Zo daalt en stijgt de jongerenwerkloosheid ook harder als de economische groei beweegt.

The report says there could be ‘greater consequences for the targeted countries than in the past’

In a separate interview with DR, intelligence chief Thomas Ahrenkiel repeated his top line that “Russia is stepping up its hybrid attacks” across Europe, and Denmark should be on high alert for similar incidents there.

He warned that “Russia is focusing its attention in particular on the defence industry and the part of the industry that supports Ukraine,” but also more broadly on stopping any aid from reaching Ukraine.

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Role for Anant Ambani, son of India’s richest person, who also runs a controversial mega-zoo, met with incredulity

Newcastle University is facing a backlash from conservationists over the appointment of the heir to an Indian oil and gas fortune who runs a controversial mega-zoo as a professor of sustainability.

The university announced that Anant Ambani had been given a professorship of practice for “his work in conservation, biodiversity protection, animal welfare and environmental stewardship” and “significant contributions to advancing a more sustainable future”.

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My veg patch has turned into a chard jungle and now it’s chard for breakfast, lunch and supper

Chard. It’s hard with so much chard. As Jennifer Lopez might put it if she were in my gardening shoes, I used to have a little, now I have a lot. There was too little last year, for whatever reason. I probably did something wrong. This year, I sowed more. Come summer, the crop underwhelmed me again. So I sowed still more, throwing around seeds of as many varieties as I could get hold of. Then I went off to Croatia for most of August, where there is chard aplenty. That’s not why I go there, incidentally, but it suits me because I really like it, which is just as well because on the Adriatic coast it comes with every meal.

If you have not tried chard, I’d describe it as like spinach, but more substantial. In Croatian it’s called blitva, which oddly enough is the sound my belly starts making when I eat too much of it, as I do every summer there. It can get too much. In Split, I met a woman who was so sick of chard she got rather angry at the very mention of it. She was the cousin of the wife of a famous Serbian footballer I know. She wrote pop songs for a living, but she won’t be penning a love song to blitva any time soon, I can tell you that. As she started forking it off her plate on to mine, she spat out the word blitva as if it were a profanity rather than the sound of a stomach-gurgle. And now I, too, am taking its name in vain.

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"Rex Junior" is a partial but perfectly preserved Tyrannosaurus skeleton found on the Zerbst Ranch in eastern Wyoming. A paleontologist said that the "extraordinary specimen" could rewrite 100 years of knowledge about how the T. rex looked. No photos of the exact specimen yet, but holy moly, paleontology fans! �

Live coverage of the first Formula 1 practice session for the 2026 Azerbaijan Grand Prix in Baku.

100 procent ISIS