Ofcom data points to more passive consumption amid changes to apps and fears about mental health and past posts

Posting significant events in your life, from birthdays to weddings and promotions, is a social media staple. But Jenny, like many other Britons recently, has hesitated over contributing to the infinite scroll.

“I wouldn’t have even posted my wedding really,” she says. “But I had to because … There’s like an etiquette. Nobody else can post your wedding until you’ve posted. So my friends were like: ‘Please post, it’s been like a week.’”

Brings old-school charm to a touristy part of town

Burro, a new Italian restaurant in Covent Garden, London, had been on my horizons even before the napkins were on order, because Conor Gadd, the chef-owner, has form. His first restaurant Trullo, up in Islington, has sat unshakably around the top of my recommendations list for about 15 years and is namechecked by me at least twice weekly when complete strangers want a tip for a birthday, proposal or a client they need to impress. Or simply, “somewhere to take a foodie” who “really likes food”. Yes, the brief given to restaurant critics is often that vague, but to all these things I say: “Have you been to Trullo? Order the beef shin ragu and some good red wine. It’s been there for ages and they know what they’re doing.”

While trends came and went – no reservations, no tablecloths, no seats, just benches and upturned buckets – Trullo kept on being an actual grownup restaurant. And now Gadd, via Burro, is bringing some of that authority and old-school charm to a more touristy side of town; to be specific, a few minutes from Covent Garden tube, off King Street in a hidden courtyard that leads down to Floral Street. Burro’s menu certainly has elements of her big sister, but perhaps erring more on the elegant but hearty side. Take the rough-hewn, well seasoned, luscious paté of Venetian chicken livers on a thick slab of bruschetta that sits on the antipasti section of the menu, but in all honesty would do as a main course with a glass of something bright, sharp and white to cut through all that fattiness. Or simply a negroni, as chosen by my dining companion, the long-suffering Charles.

As the Middle East is drawn into war, expats and influencers are under pressure to only share the positive side of the UAE. In reality many are at risk of being put behind bars, and often find the UK government has little interest in helping them get out

A four-metre barbed-wire fence runs through the desert at the UAE‑Omani border. In the early hours of 17 February 2021, Albert Douglas, 58, a British businessman, was creeping along it, looking for a way through. Douglas, who cuts a slight figure, wears spectacles and has a broad, earnest smile, never expected things to come to this. He’d been forced to abandon his home on Dubai’s Palm Jumeirah, the tree-shaped archipelago lined with upmarket residences, and go into hiding. Usually he’d be driving around in a Rolls-Royce, now he was in a pickup truck, being chauffeured by people smugglers. They’d transported him to the edge of the Al Ain border, which neighbours Oman, in the dead of the night. It was incredible, really, how fast the life he once led could evaporate. All that mattered now was getting to the other side of that fence.

A few weeks earlier, Douglas had been sitting at home, watching his supreme court appeal via video link. He was being hounded by the Dubai authorities over debts incurred by his son Wolfgang Douglas’s company and, while Wolfgang was in the UK, Albert had been arrested. Albert was facing a £2.5m fine and a three-year prison sentence – this was his final chance for a reprieve. He had always believed the truth would prevail, but as he watched the hearing play out, his faith in the system deserted him. He decided to lie low in a friend’s apartment while he weighed his options. It soon became clear that he didn’t have any. “That’s when I decided to leave,” he says. “I left it not to the last minute, but the last second.”

Viral reviews of artisan cafes across the capital are sparking a debate over cost, culture – and who gets a slice of the city

The video that started it all was innocuous enough: a woman in her 20s posted on TikTok about how she spends a perfect weekend in north London. On her list were the bakeries Jolene and Gail’s, and the De Beauvoir Deli.

The reaction, however, was anything but. Many locals commented that they had never heard of the businesses she mentioned. One north Londoner, Moses Combe, 21, was equally incredulous. “If this is where all the north London girlies come in the morning, I’d be a bit surprised,” he said in a viral video.

Britain is reportedly considering aligning with EU rules in what Daily Mail is calling the PM’s ‘breakfast reset’

The story is, in Fleet Street terminology, a marmalade dropper. The name marmalade is being dropped.

But is it?

Sinking into a cup of cocoa softens many of life’s problems, but quality varies. Which are fudgy pleasures and which are simply powdered pap?

• The best supermarket coffee, tasted and rated

A hot cup of cocoa is one of life’s great pleasures, especially for the feeling of sheer comfort and nostalgia it conjures up.

These days, there is drinking chocolate of exceptional quality out there, which just didn’t exist in my childhood. It’s made with some of the finest chocolate in the world: bean-to-bar, single-origin or even single-estate, and often made from grated bean-to-bar chocolate and nothing else.

The rescue of the air man from the F-15E fighter jet was announced by Donald Trump in a late night social media post

• Middle East crisis – live updates

The second crew member of a downed F-15E fighter jet has been rescued by US forces, ending a dramatic two day search after the warplane crashed in south west Iran.

The crew member sustained some injuries, said Donald Trump in a social media post soon after midnight EST. The US president called the operation to recover the airman “one of most daring search and rescue operations in U.S history”.

Exclusive: Guardian investigation finds several clinics making potentially unlawful claims about benefits of unregulated therapies

• What are peptides, are they safe and is there evidence to back up the hype?

The medicines regulator is investigating whether UK clinics are breaking the law by making claims about the benefits of unregulated, experimental peptide therapies, the Guardian can reveal.

Interest in experimental peptides has boomed in recent years. The substances are delivered by injection and are touted by sellers, influencers and even some medics as aiding everything from anti-ageing to recovery from injury.

Met police say 19-year-old was detained in connection with attack after officers recognised him at arraignment

A fourth person has been arrested in connection with the arson attack on Jewish volunteer ambulances in north-west London, the Metropolitan police has said.

The force said the 19-year-old man was arrested on Saturday morning at Westminster magistrates court, where three other men were charged over the arson attack.

Charities suggest ‘gendered understanding’ of crime means services often fail to recognise girls and young women as victims

An increasing number of girls are being identified as victims of county lines exploitation, figures have shown.

Data from Catch22, the charity that provides the national county lines support service, said girls and young women formed 22% of its caseload in 2025, up from 15% the previous year.