Sofia Elizabella Wyciślik-Wilson

Nobody likes to share bad news, and PayPal is no different. Price increases certainly fall into the category of bad news, and PayPal has decided to publish the details as "Policy Updates". But it's not just the price hike that's included in this misleadingly-titled document -- there's also something rather weird.

If you are a seller -- such as on eBay or other shopping sites -- you will soon be subject to a "non-discouragement clause". What does this mean? In short it means that sellers are not permitted to encourage shoppers to use another payment method instead of PayPal. Let's drill into the detail.

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The modern Microsoft places more importance on the cloud than ever before, and this means addressing the security concerns that users might have. As part of this, the company has upgraded and redesigned its Trust Center, home to a wealth of security information.

Designed to provide "support and resources for information professionals, as well as the legal and compliance community," the Trust Center is also of interest to anyone concerned about security in general and those who want to know how Microsoft is complying with laws around the world.

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Twitter has tried various methods of cracking down on trolling and abuse, and it is now rolling out its latest batch of safety measures. The most recent change only lasted a few hours before it was killed off due to protests.

In a seemingly well-intentioned move, Twitter decided to no longer notify users when they were added to lists. The idea was that lists could be used as a form of abuse: you might not be able to message someone, but you could add them to a list called "you're a douchebag", and they would be notified. But the change did not last very long at all.

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It's only a matter of weeks since we were talking about the impending arrival of Instant Tethering. This delight of technology makes it possible to quickly and painlessly share a data connection between devices, and now it's officially available to Pixel and Nexus devices.

To use Google's explanation, Instant Tethering means "you can automatically share a cellular data connection between certain Pixel and Nexus devices via Wi-Fi when they're signed in to the same Google Account." Now the rollout is official, and many people are able to make use of this very handy feature.

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The days of dedicated satnavs are surely numbered, with the likes of Waze and Google Maps bringing turn-by-turn directions to smartphone owners for free. The feature set for these apps just keeps on growing, and Google Maps now includes a new Lists feature which lets you use the app to create and share lists of places.

There are lots of possible uses for Lists -- Google suggests using it to create your bucket list of places to visit, but it's better used to draw up a list of places to visit on vacation, say, and then share it with friends who are planning a similar trip. While lists can only be created in the iOS and Android app, they can also be viewed on the desktop.

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It has been a little while coming, but WhatsApp is finally rolling out support for two-step verification to its messaging app.

The extra layer of security means that it is now more difficult to gain unauthorized access to an account, and it is a feature that is being made available to iOS, Android and Windows users. With the feature enabled, if you -- or anyone else, for that matter -- tries to verify your phone number on WhatsApp, you -- or they -- will have to provide the 6-digit passcode you create.

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When there is an emergency somewhere in the world -- be it a natural disaster, terrorist attack or humanitarian crisis -- it has become normal to see Facebook's Safety Check feature kick in. As well as letting those affected by the crisis in question let their loved ones know that they are OK, Safety Check activations also result in a flood of thoughts, prayers and sad-faced emoji being sent by Facebookers.

But what about sending actual help? Sending thoughts and prayers is something of an empty gesture, whereas offering shelter, food and other supplies could actually help to save lives. Facebook has now expanded its Safety Check tool to include Community Help, enabling helpful souls to lend support in times of need.

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In a move that will surprise few people familiar with the newspaper, Wikipedia has chosen to ban the use of the British Daily Mail as a source. Editors for the site reached the conclusion that the paper "is generally unreliable, and its use as a reference is to be generally prohibited".

While this does not constitute an outright ban -- something which would probably not go down well with the Wikipedia community -- editors are strongly encouraged to find an alternative source wherever possible. The decision comes after a vote in which editors debated the Daily Mail's "reputation for poor fact checking, sensationalism, and flat-out fabrication". In other words: fake news.

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The Email Privacy Act (HR 387) has passed through the House of Representatives for the second time. It's an attempt to update the now-ancient Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) from 1986 which gave cause for concern as it grants the government the ability to access emails and data older than 180 days which is stored on third-party servers without the need for a warrant.

The Email Privacy Act changes that. Privacy advocates are currently celebrating the fact that the updated Act has been approved by the House, but it now needs to pass through the Senate -- where it already faltered last year. Google is among those to welcome the Act's progress.

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A huge proportion of web traffic comes from mobile devices these days, and this means people are often trying to access online articles when they have a slow data connection. For this reason, Facebook introduced Instant Articles, and Google introduced Accelerated Mobile Pages.

Both of these technologies allow for near-instantaneous loading of pre-cached, optimized articles on mobile devices, but they have a problem. Both mask the original URL which can make it difficult to share interesting articles with others. Google has seen the problem and made an important change to the way AMP works, helping to increase trust.

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A US judge has ordered Google to comply with FBI search warrants which ask for customer emails that are stored outside of the US. This is in stark contrast to a recent case in which a federal appeal court ruling concluded that Microsoft did not need to comply with such orders.

The FBI issued a warrant in relation to a fraud case, and Google argued that because the emails in question were stored on foreign servers, the authorities should not be able to seize the data. However, Google has been told that transferring the emails to another server for investigation by the FBI does not constitute seizure, but conceded it was a potential invasion of privacy.

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Git is a widely used version control system, but it's one that does not cope well with scaling up. As projects and codebases grow, performance can suffer massively, with common tasks taking hours to perform. Today, Microsoft comes up with an answer: GVFS.

Git Virtual File System has come into being partly because of the problems Microsoft itself has encountered with Git. The sheer size of the Windows codebase means that a simple operation such as checkout can take three or more hours. As the V in GVFS, the solution is a virtualization system that works at file system level to make it appear as though all of the files in a repo are present, saving lots of downloading.

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Outlook mobile is, believe it or not, two years old. Microsoft is not fighting the terrible twos, but instead celebrating by bringing add-ins to the iOS Outlook app.

While it is iOS users who are treated to the first look at add-ins, there are plans to bring them to Android as well. In addition to add-ins direct from Microsoft, there are also offerings from the likes of Evernote, GIPHY, Nimble, Trello and Smartsheet which will "help you accomplish awesome things you simply couldn't do before from email."

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Valve, the company behind games distribution platform Steam, is being investigated by EU antitrust regulators. Agreements in place between Valve and five game publishers that implement geo-blocking in titles could breach European competition rules.

Valve, alongside Bandai Namco, Capcom, Focus Home, Koch Media and ZeniMax, is under investigation to determine whether the practice of restricting access to games and prices based on location is legal. At the same time the European Commission is launching an investigation into ASUS, Denon & Marantz, Philips and Pioneer for price manipulation.

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If you're using the Facebook app on your phone, you might notice the appearance of a new Discover People section. As you would probably guess this is a feature designed to connect you with people on the social network, but there's something of a creepy twist.

Unlike the current "People you may know" section which suggests that you might like to become friends with people because you have a common acquaintance, the experimental Discover People adopts a different approach. It suggests that you become friends with complete strangers.

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