The Handover
Thursday 5 November 2026
The day in 7 stories, as Asia signs off and New York wakes up.
AI
Oracle cancels $7bn Tencent AI deal under Trump pressure
Oracle cancelled a $7bn AI deal with Tencent. The partnership collapsed under pressure from Trump.
Security
PHP flaw hidden two years; hackers hit French blood banks, bank
A critical PHP software flaw went hidden for two years and was exploited in attacks on US government servers, according to reports. The attacks expose the risks of unpatched software.
Health & Medicine
FDA approves first functional cure for chronic hepatitis B
The FDA approved GSK's Hibsago for chronic hepatitis B. In trial responders, the virus stayed undetectable for at least 24 weeks after treatment ended.
Security
French blood service says cyberattack hit cold-storage rooms
Cyberattacks manipulating supermarket freezers have spread to at least 11 European countries and affected refrigeration at three French blood banks. Authorities have made no formal attribution.
Science
Study suggests quantum computer could crack RSA-2048 encryption in three days
Alice & Bob researchers estimate a quantum computer with about 23,000 cat qubits could crack RSA-2048 encryption in just over three days. The study is not peer reviewed, and no such machine exists.
Health & Medicine
One in three babies with suspected peanut allergy pass food challenge
An Australian-led study found more than one in three Australian babies thought to have a peanut allergy did not. The findings prompted calls for routine supervised oral food challenges.
AI research
AI agents can match frontier models at training other models
Researchers at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and ByteDance trained AI agents to improve other models. The larger agent matched GLM-5.2 and GPT 5.5 on PostTrainBench under the same evaluation conditions.
The Handover is the day in a handful of stories, weekday evenings at 8pm your time, and a thread on X at 7am in New York and in London. Get it by email or push from your account, or subscribe by email.
Also posted as a thread on X: @zotpaper.