Aussies trying to secretly carry out "asset wash sales" to boost their tax returns will be slugged with a range of penalties, the Australian Taxation Office has warned.

Wash sales are a type of tax avoidance the ATO says it will use "sophisticated data analytics" to detect, as millions of Australians get set to lodge their tax claims.

The scheme typically involves selling assets such as crypto and shares just before the end of the financial year, and after a short period of time buying back the same or similar assets.

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This method of tax avoidance creates a loss to offset against a gain.

Assistant Commissioner Tim Loh said some tax accountants are actively helping clients wash assets this way.

"Don't hang yourself out to dry by engaging in a wash sale," Loh said, while detailing various tax, interest and penalties that anyone caught may face.

"Most tax advisors do the right thing, but a small number encourage this behaviour," he said, warning of "serious consequences" for offenders.

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A wash sale is different from normal buying and selling of assets because it is done for the artificial purpose of generating a tax benefit for the current financial year.

If carried out, the taxpayer can realise a capital gains loss and obtain an unfair tax benefit.

Using powerful analytics tools, the ATO said it can identify wash sales through access to data from share registries and crypto asset exchanges.

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WARNING: Video above may disturb some readers.

The mall was nothing extraordinary, but in the middle of a war it was an escape for those in this Ukrainian city who had decided not to flee.

Then it exploded in a Russian airstrike.

In moments on Monday afternoon, a summer hangout became a hellish inferno.

Life and death depended on a shopper's decision whether to heed yet another air raid siren and take shelter. Among those who stayed, at least 18 are dead, more than 20 are missing and scores are wounded.

READ MORE: 'Shall we play a game?': 'Q' returns after nearly two years of silence

The crowded mall in Kremenchuk, which housed the largest toy store in town, is now the latest shorthand for allegations of war crimes against Russia.

As with earlier attacks on a theatre, a train station and a hospital elsewhere in Ukraine, authorities in Moscow said the mall was not the target.

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One day after the airstrike, the scene still smelled of charred debris.

Grit hung in the air, irritating the skin and throats. Visitors laid red carnations, a spot of colour in the still-smoking ruins.

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Images on social media showed the burned body of a woman, white sneakers still intact, who appeared to have been caught in the blast as she tried to run. In another video, around the time of impact, a man could be heard calling for his mother.

One mall employee, who gave only his first name, Oleksandr, said he had stepped outside with a colleague for a cigarette when the air raid siren went off. He described the moment of impact.

READ MORE: 'A bombshell': Trump aides left speechless by Hutchinson testimony

“There was darkness in my eyes for two minutes,” he said.

“There was a black tunnel, smoke, fire. I started to crawl. I saw the sun up there, and my brain was telling me I needed to save myself.”

Everything was on fire, he said.

A blast wave threw him under a car. He couldn’t hear. Bits of shrapnel were embedded in his leg.

“Thank God that was it,” he said. “I was very lucky.”

He estimated 1000 shoppers and employees had been in the mall at the time, contradicting Russia's claim that it was empty.

Kateryna Romashnya had just reached the mall on her walk home from work when the explosion threw her to the ground and blew out nearby windows.

Stunned, she estimated that 10-15 minutes passed before another explosion occurred.

“I realised I needed to get away,” Romashnya said, and she ran with all her strength.

“It was terrifying,” she said, and began to cry.

“You have to be a real monster” to destroy a mall, she said.

“I don’t have words anymore.”

Ukrainian authorities said that in addition to the direct hit on the mall, a factory was struck, but denied it housed weapons, as Russian officials alleged.

Dr Kostyantyn Manayenkov, the chief surgeon at a Kremenchuk hospital treating the wounded, said nine people in intensive care were in “very bad condition”.

There had been skull injuries and some amputations, he said.

Some bodies were so badly burned that they were unrecognisable, said Denis Monastyrsky, Ukraine’s minister of internal affairs, who visited the scene.

Identifying them could take days, he added.

Those inside the mall had had seven to 10 minutes to leave and get to safety when the warning sounded, he said.

A shelter was just across the street.

Monastyrsky again pleaded with Ukrainians who have lived with such sirens for four months now to understand the danger and to act.

The country's prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, emphasised that all Ukrainians must remain alert and expect a similar strike “every minute.”

But near sunset on Tuesday, some residents could only stand and stare at the debris.

“Say something!” one man cried, trying to rouse them.

“Pray to God that he will help us!”

When President Donald Trump learned his attorney general had publicly rejected his election fraud claims, he heaved his lunch at the wall with such force the porcelain plate shattered and ketchup streamed down.

On the morning of January 6, 2021, consumed by crowd size concerns, he directed staff to remove metal detectors he feared would inconvenience supporters who had amassed in Washington. Never mind that some were armed — they weren't there to hurt him, he said.

And later that day, irate at being driven back to the White House instead of the Capitol, Trump tried to wrestle control of the steering wheel of the presidential vehicle and uttered words to the effect of, "I am the f'ing president. Take me up to the Capitol now."

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Trump's volcanic temper has been the stuff of lore throughout his career in business, but during his presidency it has never been described with such evocative detail as in the testimony of Cassidy Hutchinson, a junior White House staffer whose proximity to the then president and top aides that day gave her a remarkably close view.

Hutchinson offered previously unknown details about the extent of Trump's rage in his final weeks of office, his awareness that supporters had weapons with them and his ambivalence as rioters later laid siege to the Capitol.

The testimony came as the Justice Department expands its investigation into the insurrection and deepened, but did not resolve, questions about whether Trump himself could face criminal charges for his conduct. Though Attorney General Merrick Garland has given no hint about whether his department will bring a criminal case against Trump, some legal experts said Hutchinson's testimony could give prosecutors additional facts to pursue.

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Potentially problematic for Trump could be his reaction on the morning of January 6 to news that guns, knives and other weapons were being confiscated from security screenings as crowds of supporters gathered for a rally in front of the White House. Angry that not everyone could get in to see him, Trump, according to Hutchinson, said words to the effect of, "I don't care that they have weapons. They are not here to hurt me. Take the f'ing mags away and they can march to the Capitol." "Mags" is a reference to magnetometers.

"A congressional hearing is not a court of law, but if this isn't powerful evidence that he wasn't just aware of the possibility of violence on the 6th but that he actively wanted to encourage it, I'm not sure what is," said Stephen Vladeck, a University of Texas law professor.

Whatever any outcome related to a criminal proceeding, the disclosures come as Trump is laying the groundwork for another presidential run in 2024.

READ MORE: Trump aides left speechless but Hutchinson testimony

Aides have been debating the merits of when he should announce his intentions, with some arguing he should do so as soon as this summer to maximise leverage and stave off a crowd of likely challengers and others maintaining he should follow tradition and wait until after November's midterm elections.

Looking to blunt negative publicity surrounding her testimony, Trump issued a statement on his social media platform denying that he had ever complained about the crowd size or had sought to "make room for people with guns to watch my speech."

Trump is well-practiced at marginalising his critics and accusers, but Hutchinson's well-calibrated testimony will test that power anew.

Tuesday's hearing, the sixth by the House committee investigating the insurrection, was accompanied by suspense even before it began. It was hastily announced on Monday, but the committee did not reveal the identity of the witness until Hutchinson entered the room.

READ MORE: QAnon's 'Q' returns after nearly two years of silence

Where prior hearings have involved clusters of witnesses who have recounted pressure campaigns on the Justice Department, or on local election officials, to overturn the election results, Tuesday's hearing involved a singular narrator with an easy-to-follow tale sprinkled with had-to-be-there color. Some anecdotes she witnessed herself. Others she heard from fellow staffers.

She recalled, for instance, being in the White House on the afternoon of December 1, 2020 when she heard a sudden noise. Trump, it turned out, had just learned of an interview Attorney General William Barr had given to The Associated Press in which Barr said the Justice Department had not found widespread fraud that could alter the outcome of the election.

Inside the dining room was a shattered porcelain plate on the floor, apparently thrown in dismay by the president. Ketchup streamed down the wall. Hutchinson grabbed a towel to wipe it off.

She later heard about a separate episode on the afternoon of January 6 when Trump tried to grab control of the steering wheel of the presidential vehicle so that it would take him to the Capitol and not to the White House. He was, he said, "the f'ing president." Trump was directed to take his hand off the wheel.

In that instance and others, according to the testimony, the president's will did not always prevail and Hutchinson detailed aides' best efforts to rein in Trump's worst impulses. The morning of January 6, for instance, White House counsel Pat Cipollone cautioned Hutchinson that if Trump did go to the Capitol to intervene in the certification of the election, "We're going to get charged with every crime imaginable."

Whether the Justice Department thinks it has a case against the president, especially one that could further divide an already polarised nation, remains an open question. But there's also no doubt that the investigation is expanding far beyond the rioters themselves, with law enforcement officials last week serving a wave of subpoenas across the country to state elections officials.

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"When you have witnesses who are in these conversations, who are in these rooms, who are actively participating in the high-level discussions of January 6, it seems to me that one of two things has to be true: either they're lying or President Trump and a lot of people close to him are in serious jeopardy," Vladeck said.

Instagram is blocking posts that mention abortion from public view, in some cases requiring its users to confirm their age before letting them view posts that offer up information about the procedure.

Over the last day, several Instagram accounts run by abortion rights advocacy groups have found their posts or stories hidden with a warning that described the posts as “sensitive content.”

In one example, Instagram covered a post on one page with more than 25,000 followers that shared text reading: “Abortion in America How You Can Help.” .

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The post went on to encourage followers to donate money to abortion organizations and to protest the Supreme Court’s decision to strip constitutional protections for abortion in the US.

The post was slapped with a warning from Instagram that covered the post, reading “This photo may contain graphic or violent content.”

Berlin photographer Zoe Noble has run the Instagram page, which celebrates women who decide not to have children, for more than a year. Monday was the first time a post mentioning abortion was restricted by Instagram.

“I was really confused because we’ve never had this happen before, and we’ve talked about abortion before,” Noble said.

“I was really shocked that the word abortion seemed to be flagged.”

The platform offers no way for users to dispute the restriction.

READ MORE: 'A bombshell': Trump aides left speechless by Hutchinson testimony

The Associated Press identified nearly a dozen other posts that mentioned the word “abortion” and were subsequently covered up by Instagram.

All of the posts were informational in nature, and none of the posts featured photos of abortions. An Instagram post by an AP reporter that asked people if they were experiencing the problem was also covered by the company on Tuesday, and required users to enter their age in order to view it.

The AP inquired about the problem on Tuesday morning. Hours later, Instagram’s communication department acknowledged the problem on Twitter, describing it as a glitch.

“We’re hearing that people around the world are seeing our ‘sensitivity screens,’ on many different types of content when they shouldn’t be. We’re looking into this bug and working on a fix now," the company tweeted.

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A spokesman for Instagram-owner Meta Platforms Inc. said in an email that the company does not place age restrictions around its abortion content.

Instagram's latest issue follows a Monday AP report that Facebook and Instagram were promptly deleting posts that offered to mail out abortion pills in states that restrict their use.

The tech platforms said they were deleting the posts because they violated policies against selling or gifting certain products, including pharmaceuticals, drugs and firearms.

The AP’s review found that similar posts offering to mail a gun or marijuana were not removed by Facebook. The company did not respond to questions about the discrepancy.

After 563 days of quiet, seven words broke the silence.

Q, the mysterious and shadowy figure behind the QAnon conspiracy movement, had suddenly emerged, surprising followers with a series of short posts.

The posts on far-right message board 8kun on June 24 were Q's first since December 2020, following Donald Trump's bitter and ugly US election defeat.

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"Shall we play a game once more?" said the first message, which was signed off by "Q".

According to the New York Times, the Q account on 8kun used a unique identifier linked to previous Q posts, known as "Q drops" to followers.

An 8kun forum user quickly asked why Q had been absent for so long, to which the account replied: "It had to be done this way."

That was then followed by a later post: "Are you ready to serve your country again? Remember your oath."

The unexpected Q drops, made on the same day the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, sparked a frisson of excitement among QAnon followers, who had rapidly grown in size heading into Trump's failed 2020 re-election bid.

Followers of the false QAnon conspiracy theory believe there is a "deep state" within the US government controlled by a cabal of Satan-worshiping, baby-eating paedophiles.

According to the theory, to which all references and groups were later blocked and banned on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube, the cabal is largely run by Democratic politicians and liberal celebrities who traffic children.

In the minds of the QAnon self-styled "patriots", they would help Trump take down the evil cabal, and their work would culminate on a day known as "The Storm", when thousands would be arrested to face military tribunals and executions.

But after Trump's defeat, the failure of prophecies to materialise and Q's subsequent vanishing, the movement grew disillusioned and began to fizzle, but not before the January 6 Capitol insurrection when many so-called patriots joined the invading mob.

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Who is Q?

There has long been speculation about who is Q.

Patriots believed the person was part of Trump's innermost-circle, perhaps a US intelligence official with Q-level clearance which gave access to top secret, classified information.

Some theorised it was even Trump himself.

During his ill-fated 2020 campaign, Trump refused to publicly shut down the QAnon conspiracy and appeared to revel in stoking intrigue inside the movement.

However, in February, two separate companies in Europe using powerful algorithm-based machine-learning and stylometry – a forensic tool which can decipher writing styles – worked independently to analyse the writings of Q.

Swiss start-up OrphAnalytics and a French company of computational linguists both concluded that two people were likely behind Q.

The two men were Paul Furber, a South African software developer and tech journalist, and Ron Watkins, a former administrator of the notorious website 8kun, which is still owned by his maverick businessman father, Jim.

Watkins, who denies he is Q, is now running for Congress in Arizona.

Furber, a believer of the debunked Pizzagate conspiracy who lives in Johannesburg, has also rejected any assertion he is or was Q.

Speaking to 9news.com.au from an undisclosed base in Switzerland, OrphAnalytics founder Claude-Alain Roten said the four most recent Q drops over the weekend had a very "familiar" style and feel.

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OrphAnalytics was now analysing those posts.

Roten confirmed it would take "some weeks" to run the texts through his company's stylometric processes and reach a conclusion as to who was the most likely author.

He was, however, happy to offer his initial impression.

"The texts of the last four Q drops are written in a style familiar to us," Roten said.

Before the weekend, Q had not posted since December 8, 2020, when a Q drop linked out to a pro-Trump video featuring rebellion anthem We're Not Gonna Take It from the 1980s heavy metal band Twisted Sister.

But with so long between drops, some thought Q may have disappeared forever.

The Q drops first appeared on fringe messaging board 4chan in October 2017 but later moved to 8kun, which had changed its name from 8chan after the Christchurch mosque shooter had used it to post his shooting manifesto and live links to his attack.

Patriots believed the cryptic posts from Q, which numbered in total close to 5000, held secret messages which were feverishly picked apart and pored over by online armies of QAnon fanatics.

The Q drops succeeded in mobilising supporters in a remarkable way.

They emerged from the anonymity of the web's darkest reaches to form a genuine far-right public and political movement which staunchly idolised Trump.

Watching from Switzerland, Roten was disturbed by what he saw from QAnon as the 2020 election gathered steam and heat.

He said it felt "important" for his company, OrphAnalytics, to try and work out who was behind Q.

Even then, months away from the January 6 riots, Roten said he had a bad feeling.

"In our mind, it was clear that something very particular would happen after the election," he said.

It was analysis of Q's posts, using stylometry techniques first made popular by the FBI in catching the Unabomber, which saw OrphAnalytics decipher authorship of the messages and reveal the clues that led to Watkins and Furber.

READ MORE: 'It's like a parasite': How a dangerous virtual cult is going global

Key Q suspects narrowed to two men

In 2020, OrphAnalytics broke Q's texts into three-character sequences and tracked the recurrence of each possible combination.

A group of suspects who may have been Q were analysed, Roten said, including people mentioned in news investigations and high-profile figures inside the QAnon movement.

Statistical analyses by OrphAnalytics can establish an "individual signature" in the way someone writes, which much like a fingerprint can be used to pinpoint a suspect.

"Among plausible suspects, Ron Watkins is the most likely author for an overwhelming part of Q drops," OrphAnalytics said in a 2022 white paper revealing its findings.

But there was much more to QAnon, Roten said, explaining there appeared to be two distinct periods to the thousands of Q drops.

The first period ran from October to December in 2017 on the 4chan forum.

Analysis of those 4chan messages, Roten said, pointed to "possible co-authorship of QAnon seminal messages" by Watkins and Furber.

But Watkins' signature "becomes clearer" as time passes, OrphAnalytics found.

Using different methodologies, both OrphAnalytics and their French counterparts noted "a willing or unwilling collaboration" between Watkins and Furber as a plausible possibility while Q drops were appearing on 4chan.

But at the end of 2017, the Q drops suddenly moved to 8chan from 4chan.

During the second QAnon period, from December 2017 to November 2020, OrphAnalytics said Q drops on 8chan "unambiguously points to a single signature, namely Ron Watkins".

Of course, at the time, Watkins was an administrator of 8chan, which afforded him access to all parts of the site, its code and oversight of users.

Ghislaine Maxwell has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for helping the wealthy financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse teenage girls.

The sentencing on Tuesday was the culmination of a prosecution that detailed how Epstein and Maxwell flaunted their riches and associations with prominent people to groom vulnerable girls and then exploit them.

Those crimes occurred even as the couple hobnobbed with some of the world's most famous and wealthy people, including former US presidents Bill Clinton and Donald Trump and England's Prince Andrew.

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US District Judge Alison J Nathan had earlier ruled the federal sentencing guideline she would rely upon in sentencing the 60-year-old Maxwell was a range between 15½ and 19½ years in prison, roughly half of the 30- to 55-year term sought by federal prosecutors. Defence attorneys wanted a five-year term.

The hearing was so long that Nathan called for a half-hour lunch break, unusual for such proceedings.

Maxwell, wearing a blue prison uniform with her ankles shackled and a white mask to conform with coronavirus rules, sat quietly through the first hour of the sentencing hearing as lawyers debated the law.

At least three of her siblings sat in a row behind her. Most of the others in the crowded courtroom were members of the media.

Several women who testified against Maxwell or released statements prior to sentencing also were in court. Two of them — Elizabeth Stein and Sarah Ransome — spoke to reporters outside.

"Today is a day I didn't think would ever happen, so for me it's a blessing. It really is. And I've prayed for this moment so hard and for so long," Ransome said.

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"It will be very vindicating to speak my statements and have her in the room to hear it," Stein said.

Prosecutors said Epstein, who killed himself in 2019 while awaiting trial, sexually abused children hundreds of times over more than a decade, and couldn't have done so without the help of Maxwell, his longtime companion and onetime girlfriend.

In December, a jury convicted Maxwell of sex trafficking, transporting a minor to participate in illegal sex acts and two conspiracy charges.

"Maxwell's conduct was shockingly predatory. She was a calculating, sophisticated, and dangerous criminal who preyed on vulnerable young girls and groomed them for sexual abuse," prosecutors wrote in a court filing.

Maxwell denies abusing anyone.

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"The witnesses at trial testified about Ms Maxwell's facilitation of Epstein's abuse, but Epstein was always the central figure: Epstein was the mastermind, Epstein was the principal abuser, and Epstein orchestrated the crimes for his personal gratification," defence attorneys wrote in a court filing.

Epstein and Maxwell's associations with some of the world's most famous people were not a prominent part of the trial but mentions of friends like Clinton, Trump and Andrew showed how the pair exploited their connections to impress their prey.

Over the past 17 years, scores of women have accused Epstein of abusing them. Many described Maxwell as acting as a madam who recruited them to give massages to Epstein.

The trial, though, revolved around allegations from only a handful of those women.

Four testified that they were abused as teens in the 1990s and early 2000s at Epstein's mansions in Florida, New York, New Mexico and the Virgin Islands.

Three were identified in court only by their first names or pseudonyms to protect their privacy: Jane, a television actress; Kate, an ex-model from the UK; and Carolyn, now a mum recovering from drug addiction. The fourth was Annie Farmer, who identified herself in court by her real name after speaking out publicly.

They described how Maxwell charmed them with conversation and gifts and promises that Epstein could use his wealth and connections to help fulfil their dreams.

Then, they testified, she led them to give massages to Epstein that turned sexual and played it off as normal.

Carolyn testified that she was one of several underprivileged teens who lived near Epstein's Florida home in the early 2000s and took up an offer to massage him in exchange for US$100 bills in what prosecutors described as "a pyramid of abuse".

Maxwell made all the arrangements, Carolyn told the jury, even though she knew the girl was only 14 at the time.

The allegations against Epstein first surfaced publicly in 2005. He pleaded guilty to sex charges in Florida and served 13 months in jail, much of it in a work-release program as part of a deal criticised as lenient. Afterward, he was required to register as a sex offender.

In the years that followed, many women sued Epstein over alleged abuse. One, Virginia Giuffre, claimed that Epstein and Maxwell had also pressured her into sexual trysts with other powerful men, including Prince Andrew. All of those men denied the allegations and Giuffre ultimately settled a lawsuit against Andrew out of court.

Federal prosecutors in New York revived the case against Epstein after stories by the Miami Herald in 2018 brought new attention to his crimes. He was arrested in 2019 but killed himself a month later.

Eleven months after his death, Maxwell was arrested at a New Hampshire estate. A US, British and French citizen, she has remained in a federal jail in New York City since then as her lawyers repeatedly criticise her treatment, saying she was even unjustly placed under suicide watch days before sentencing.

Prosecutors say the claims about the jail are exaggerated and that Maxwell has been treated better than other prisoners.

Her lawyers also fought to have her conviction tossed on the grounds of juror misconduct. Days after the verdict, one juror gave media interviews in which he disclosed he had been sexually abused as a child — something he hadn't told the court during jury selection. Maxwell's lawyers said she deserved a new trial. A judge disagreed.

At least eight women submitted letters to the judge, describing the sexual abuse they said they endured for having met Maxwell and Epstein.

In letters to the judge, six of Maxwell's seven living siblings pleaded for leniency. Maxwell's fellow inmate also submitted a letter describing how Maxwell has helped to educate other inmates over the last two years.

Anne Holve and Philip Maxwell, her eldest siblings, wrote that her relationship with Epstein began soon after the 1991 death of their father, the British newspaper magnate Robert Maxwell.

They said Robert Maxwell had subjected his daughter to "frequent rapid mood swings, huge rages and rejections".

"This led her to becoming very vulnerable to abusive and powerful men who would be able to take advantage of her innate good nature," they wrote.

Prosecutors called Maxwell's shifting of blame to Epstein "absurd and offensive".

"Maxwell was an adult who made her own choices," they wrote to the court.

"She made the choice to sexually exploit numerous underage girls. She made the choice to conspire with Epstein for years, working as partners in crime and causing devastating harm to vulnerable victims.

She should be held accountable for her disturbing role in an extensive child exploitation scheme."