The Iranian photographer sees both social documentary and art in his image of two girls at a bus station

Iranian photographer Mohammad Nazari was in a bus station when he took this shot. “I was just leaving a religious ceremony in Zanjan, which is near the capital of Tehran, when I happened upon this scene completely by chance,” he says. “The glass of the bus station separated these two young girls – one with her hand outstretched and placed on the glass, the other turning to look at her. The presence of a girl without a hijab in a crowd at an ancient religious ceremony created an interesting contrast. The feeling I get from this photo is very strange.”

Nazari took the photograph on a mobile phone not out of choice but out of necessity. “My country is facing very high inflation, and cameras are very expensive, so it’s practically impossible for independent photographers like me to buy one,” he says. He instead relies on mobile phones, adding that because this model didn’t have a good enough zoom function, he had to get in close to his subects. He later applied some minor edits to the contrast and saturation.

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Focusing on phones and social media allows adults to ignore the real fears of adolescents, writes Dr Helen Care. Plus letters from Jo Johnson, Alison Watson and Arnold Brown

Lucy Foulkes makes an important point, having interviewed adults about their own past experiences: “adolescence is bewildering to live through” and smartphones are only “one piece of a large and complicated puzzle” ( I’m an expert on adolescence: here’s why a smartphone ban isn’t the answer, and what we should do instead, 15 June ). I work with teenagers, and they are fed up with the narrative that smartphones and social media are the cause of their mental health issues. It lets us adults off the hook.

How much easier it is to blame phones and social media than to acknowledge the harm we do by taking away creative outlets in school such as art, music or sport, and focusing only on targets and rote learning. And how much easier it is not to take responsibility for fixing the other aspects of their lives that bring anxiety: the climate crisis; the lack of affordable housing; the cost of living crisis. Smartphones are a distraction from the real issue facing adolescents – they are fearful for their futures. Despite this, many of the young people I work with are hopeful, determined and courageous. Let’s celebrate them and ask them what would help, instead of looking for an easy answer and taking their phones away.
Dr Helen Care
Clinical psychologist, Woodstock, Oxfordshire

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Gov. Gavin Newsom called for a statewide ban as states and large school districts have pursued similar prohibitions to prevent disruption and cyberbullying.

Thibaud Hug de Larauze says sales at his marketplace for refurbished electronics are soaring not just because people need to save money, but because they also care about waste

Thibaud Hug de Larauze is waving his iPhone, boasting that it is more than seven years old. “It works great,” he says. Not what you’d expect from a tech entrepreneur heading one of France’s biggest “unicorn” startups – Back Market – which has raised more than $1bn to expand into 18 countries.

The chief executive of the secondhand gadget marketplace says he would rather identify as an eco-warrior than a tech guru, fighting to persuade us all to buy pre-owned phones, laptops and other devices, and repair or recycle our old ones.

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The proliferation of Quick Response codes has created a cybersecurity nightmare, but public vigilance can help

Here’s a familiar scenario. You’re going to a meeting in an unfamiliar part of town. You’re running late and it’s raining. And there isn’t a car park in sight. Ah, but here’s some on-street parking and you gratefully pull into the empty bay. Now all you have to do is pay for a couple of hours and then scuttle along to your meeting. But the parking meter (of course) no longer takes coins. This is the 21st century, after all.

No worries – you can pay by phone. There are notices plastered all over the meter on how to pay using an app that – of course – you have not yet downloaded. The rain is getting heavier and there’s no mobile signal. You’re getting increasingly flustered. And then you spot that there’s a Quick Response (QR) code – a nice (if incomprehensible) square with lots of funny squares and spaces – on one side of the meter. Phew! All you have to do is scan it and you’ll be through to a website in no time. So you do and you are. Job done. Relax.

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After plans to make St Albans the first smartphone-free city for children under 14, our panellists discuss potential benefits and drawbacks

I wouldn’t mind if it was only in St Albans that headteachers want to create a smartphone-free city for under-14s . I can take reasonable steps not to live there. But banning phones for young people is raised all the time, and it’s the lazy way out. There are noticeable negative effects of extensive internet use: I’m 16, and in the middle of GCSEs – if I could get back all the revision time I’ve lost on TikTok, believe me, I would.

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Measures will impact more than 13,000 pupils in Southwark, and include confiscating phones used at school

A group of schools in London have announced they are to go smartphone-free, in a sign of the growing public concern over phone-based childhoods.

Headteachers at 17 of the 20 state secondary schools in Southwark, south London, have taken the collective action to shift their pupils away from smartphones, with the specific hope of also addressing the downsides of their use outside the school gates.

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Children can view internet unrestricted by entering a certain nonsense phrase into Safari address bar

Apple has promised to fix a years-old bug in its parental controls that allows children to bypass restrictions and view adult content online.

The bug, by which a child could get around controls by simply entering a certain nonsense phrase into the address bar on Safari, was first reported to the company in 2021.

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The photographer got as close as he could when cadets’ endurance, strength and teamwork were tested at Canada’s Royal Military College

Every year, as spring blooms, first-year officer cadets of Canada’s Royal Military College in Kingston, Ontario, take part in a series of competitions. The challenges and obstacle course aim to test their strength, endurance and teamwork.

“As long as you don’t mind getting a little wet and don’t step on any of the smoke canisters, you can get really close to the action,” says Elliot Ferguson, who had captured the event before in his capacity as a news and sports photographer.

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