Hundreds of New South Wales' most dangerous domestic violence offenders have been arrested and charged in a four-day police crackdown.

Operation Amarok II ran from last Wednesday to Saturday across the entire state and led to the arrests of 644 people – 314 of whom were identified by police as being among NSW's highest-risk DV offenders.

Of those 314, more than half (164) had outstanding warrants for violent offences.

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"The NSW government will continue to support a wider strategy to address domestic violence so that anyone who commits these crimes can expect police to come knocking," Police and Counter-Terrorism Minister Yasmin Catley said.

"The statistics following Amarok II speak for themselves – 644 arrested and charged with serious offences – and show that police are making a difference every day to address the complex issue of domestic violence.

"The NSW government will support police to address domestic violence from all angles – from victim support, diverse reporting options and educating the public, to operations such as Amarok which target the most violent offenders."

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Following the arrests made during the operation, 1108 charges were laid, which, in addition to domestic violence, also covered a range of other offences, including prohibited firearm and weapon possession, and drug possession and supply.

Commissioner Karen Webb said reducing the risk of harm to faced by domestic violence victims remains a key priority for NSW Police.

"Perpetrators are on notice; the Amarok arm of our strategy focuses on them, including assessing their intent, their capability to inflict harm and the access they have to their current or future victims," she said.

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"We will continue proactive Amarok deployments, along with the use of a sophisticated suite of strategies, to target dangerous domestic violence offending and protect our communities."

As part of the four-day operation, police made 326 applications for apprehended domestic violence orders (ADVOs) and served 460 outstanding ADVOs. They also made more than 500 combined compliance checks for ADVOs and bail.

Police also seized 23 guns and 45 prohibited weapons over the four days.

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New Zealand's North Island has been rocked by a number of strong consecutive earthquakes this morning, just hours after 7.2 magnitude quake shook the same region yesterday.

The first quake at 10.16am was at a depth of 21km near the rural settlement of Pōrangahau. It was followed by a magnitude 5.4 earthquake at a depth of 17km a few minutes later in the same location, then two smaller quakes – a mag-3.9 and a mag-3.5.

More than 25 were reported in the hour after the first quake struck.

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https://twitter.com/geonet/status/1650991790873534464?s=20

GeoNet reported the first two as "severe".

The National Emergency Management Agency confirmed there was no tsunami threat triggered by the earthquakes.

Hawke's Bay Civil Defence Emergency Management Group controller Ian Macdonald​​​ said residents could return following an earlier message that if the shaking was "long and strong" they should self-evacuate, particularly in coastal areas.

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He confirmed there had been no major damage sustained in Pōrangahau, although the local school and some residents had evacuated.

Farmers Gretchen and Leyton King​ are no strangers to quakes, but a "rumbling and wobbly" magnitude 5.9, followed by three others in quick succession, had them running for the car.

The Kings were home when the quake struck, describing it as the biggest they'd ever felt.

No stranger to earthquakes in Pōrangahau, by the time the third quake struck they decided to get out of the house where they felt safer waiting by their car.

"It was a fair jolt," Gretchen King said, adding it went on for about 30 seconds followed by the aftershocks.

"We get a fair few earthquakes but it was the biggest we've ever felt."

The "rumbling and wobbly" quake brought down a painting and mirror and a few items from household shelves, but there was no major damage to their house.

"It was a real back and forth," she said.

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The rate of inflation in Australia has slowed to an annual rate of 7 per cent, further muddying the waters of whether the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) will increase rates when it meets on Tuesday.

New data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showed that headline inflation rose by 1.4 per cent in the March quarter, and by 7 per cent on an annual basis.

Today's figure will prove crucial to the nation's economists after the RBA decided to hold the cash rate at 3.6 per cent in April.

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Annual trimmed mean inflation, a measure the RBA looks closely at, was 6.6 per cent, down from 6.9 per cent in the December quarter.

Today's data will improve the case of the RBA keeping interest rates on hold for a second month running, but is still contrast with a stubbornly high level of inflation.

Despite this, head of prices statistics at the ABS Michelle Marquardt said there are signs that price rises are beginning to ease.

"CPI inflation slowed in the March quarter, with the quarterly rise being the lowest since December 2021," Marquardt said.

"While prices continued to rise for most goods and services, many of these increases were smaller than they have been in recent quarters."

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Marquardt said that the biggest drivers of inflation in the March quarter were health and energy bills.

"Prices for medical and hospital services typically rise in the March quarter as GPs and other health service providers review their consultation fees, and the Medicare Safety Net is reset at the start of the calendar year," she said.

"This year some private health insurance premiums also increased in January, adding to the price rise for medical and hospital services.

"Tertiary education fees are also indexed at the start of the year. This quarter additional strength was seen in tertiary education as changes in student contribution bands and fees introduced in 2021 as part of the Jobs-ready Graduates Package continued to flow through to the index."

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When asked what he suspects the RBA will do next week, Treasurer Jim Chalmers said "it could go either way".

"As we've been talking about, inflation is slowing down but it's still very high. So the Reserve Bank will be looking at that," he said.

"It will also be looking at the recent jobs figures, most recent jobs figures we saw that unemployment is at 3.5 per cent, that's near a 50-year low. There's still a lot of strong job creation because employers in many areas still desperate for staff so.

"There's not much of a slow down in the jobs market. Inflation is still really strong, but, as the Reserve Bank says, the cost of living pressures and the higher interest rates are really hurting households especially low-income households."

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An empty 2300 square metre plot of sandy land on an exclusive Dubai island has sold for a staggering $51 million.

The parcel of land, which has no structures on it, is on the the man-made Jumeirah Bay Island and was sold on April 19, the Bloomberg agency reports.

The seller, British fashion entrepreneur Umar Kamani, bought the property for $15m in 2021, scooping him a fat profit of $36m before fees.

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Knight Frank, the real estate company that negotiated the off-market sale, said a dwindling supply of properties had driven up luxury real estate prices in Dubai.

The sale was noteworthy because headline-making land sales in Dubai usually have had mega mansions or luxury apartments on them.

The last most expensive land plot in the United Arab Emirates sold for $36 million.

Kamani's former property is one of the few plots of land on the seahorse-shaped Jumeirah Bay Island. It is also home to an exclusive resort and yacht club.

Last year, the most expensive property sale in Australia was a waterfront mansion in the eastern Sydney suburb of Vaucluse that fetched $62.75m.

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Real estate now represents some 10 per cent of Dubai's overall gross domestic product.

After a slump due to COVID-19 restrictions, Dubai saw 86,849 residential sales in 2022, beating a previous record of 80,831 set in 2009.

Buyers and renters have filled exclusive neighbourhoods such as the Palm Jumeirah, a man-made archipelago in the shape of a palm tree that juts into the Persian Gulf.

Russian money has helped fuel the Dubai real estate resurgence.

Betterhomes, which has operated in Dubai since 1986, saw Russians lead all other nationalities in purchases by non-residents for the first time last year.

Other real estate brokers have also acknowledged anecdotally the influence Russians have had.

– Reported with Associated Press

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Researchers have discovered a new kind of jellyfish that's a relation of our own tropical stingers – the box jellyfish dubbed the most venomous animal in the ocean.

The tiny cube-bodied jellyfish, measuring about 1.5cm, were found in Hong Kong's Mai Po nature reserve by researchers from the Hong Kong Baptist University.

"This box jellyfish connects the base of its tentacles and its bell with a flat base that looks like a boat paddle, making it distinct from other common jellyfish," Professor Qiu Jianwen from the HKBU Department of Biology said in a video online.

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"Another feature of the box jellyfish is that it has six eyes located on each side of its body."

That adds up to 24, though only two have lenses for focusing, while the other 22 can merely perceive light.

The species was named tripedalia maipensis, after the nature reserve where it was discovered.

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It is the first box jellyfish ever discovered in Chinese waters, and researchers hope it's an indication of undiscovered marine life yet to be found.

It's not yet known if the new species is able to sting humans.

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A government-imposed ban on companies paying cyber ransoms to hackers could cause "catastrophic damage" and even lead to the loss of Australian lives, the nation's biggest energy producer has warned.

AGL Energy, whose board was recently reshuffled by Atlassian billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes, described ransom bans as a dangerous double-edged sword.

Prohibiting ransoms may reduce the volume of attacks, AGL said, but it could also result in "potentially avoidable catastrophic damage, harm to community, loss of life, disruption of essential services or disclosure of sensitive information".

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"In some circumstances and for some organisations, the payment of a ransom demand may be the only path to achieving acceptable outcomes," AGL said in its 15-page submission towards a review of Australia's cyber security strategy.

The nightmare scenario for many governments is a cyberattack on power grids, paralysing vital infrastructure for massive swathes of the population.

AGL said the government should instead strongly discourage payments and revisit imposing a ban when Australia has more resilient cyber security capabilities in place.

Following a wave of high-profile attacks on some of the country's biggest companies, the government wants to bolster the national defence against devastating hacks.

The government is seeking submissions from companies, like AGL, as it sets out to modernise its cyber strategies, a move critics have argued is long overdue.

In its submission, the Australian Institute of Directors aligned with AGL, saying it "is not convinced that a strict legislative prohibition on the payment of ransoms and extortion demands by either victims or insurers is appropriate".

Finance firm Latitude and Medibank have both recently refused to pay hackers ransoms, inline with the advice of government and Australian Federal Police.

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But some international companies who have been hacked have given in to ransom demands, seeing no easy way out of a sticky situation.

JBS, the largest beef supplier in the world, paid ransomware hackers US$11 million ($16m) after a 2021 attack crippled its global operations, including facilities in Australia.

The same year, US-based Colonial Pipeline shelled out nearly $7.5 million to hackers who had shut down four major petrol pipelines.

Petrol stations across the eastern and southeastern US were thrown into chaos until the ransom deal was brokered, leading to pipelines again being turned on.

The FBI has historically discouraged, but not prohibited, US victims from paying hackers.

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A high-profile copyright trial over whether Ed Sheeran's smash single "Thinking Out Loud" copied a classic Marvin Gaye song has officially kicked off in a Manhattan federal courtroom.

Ben Crump, a lawyer representing the family of the co-writer for Gaye's 1973 hit "Let's Get It On," said in his opening statement that Sheeran played his ballad and Gaye's song back-to-back in a medley during a concert, and called the moment a "smoking gun."

Sheeran, who was present in the courtroom, is accused of copying "Let's Get It On" by the heirs of Ed Townsend, who co-wrote the song with Gaye.

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Townsend's daughter Kathryn Townsend Griffin, sister Helen McDonald and the estate of his former wife, Cherrigale Townsend, are the listed plaintiffs on the "Thinking Out Loud" case. Gaye died in 1984 and Townsend died in 2003.

In Tuesday's court proceedings, Crump attempted to portray Sheeran as someone who recognised the "magic" of Gaye's soul song and then used it to catapult his career. "Thinking Out Loud" would go on to win the 2016 Grammy award for song of the year.

"if you remember nothing else about this trial, about this case, it is about giving credit where credit is due," Crump told the jury, which was selected Monday.

Sheeran's legal team argued that the sounds used in both songs are common in pop music. "No one owns basic musical building blocks," Ilene Farkas, Sheeran's lawyer, told the jury in opening remarks.

There have been a number of prominent music copyright lawsuits in recent years.

Gaye's family has previously sued other artists for copyright infringement—and won.

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The estate successfully sued singer Robin Thicke and producer Pharrell Williams for $7.4 million ($11.1 mullion) in 2015 for borrowing from Gaye's "Got to Give It Up" for their hit "Blurred Lines," though the case turned into a five-year legal battle that ultimately saw the judgment reduced to $5.3 million ($7.9 million).

The ruling also awarded Gaye's family 50 per cent percent of the royalties from "Blurred Lines" moving forward.

But other, recent copyright cases have had different outcomes.

Taylor Swift faced a similar case in 2017 over her smash hit "Shake It Off," which was settled and dismissed last year. Led Zeppelin was sued in 2014 over its iconic tune "Stairway to Heaven" by the estate of late Randy California, former lead guitarist of the 1960s band Spirit, for lifting part of their single "Taurus."

A 2020 appeals court ruled in Led Zeppelin's favor.

Sheeran, meanwhile, has faced previous legal battles over his music and won. In a 2022 case over his song "Shape of You," a judge ruled in Sheeran's favour that he did not copy grime artist Sami Switch's song "Oh Why" after the musician accused Sheeran of plagiarizing a key part. He was also sued in 2016 over his single "Photograph," which was settled out of court.

After his successful 2022 legal battle, Sheeran posted a video to his Instagram voicing his concern over the recent wave of music copyright cases.

"It's really damaging to the songwriting industry. There's only so many notes and very few chords used in pop music. Coincidence is bound to happen if 60,000 songs are being released every day on Spotify. That's 22 million songs a year, and there's only 12 notes that are available," Sheeran said. "I'm not an entity. I'm not a corporation. I'm a human being. I'm a father. I'm a husband. I'm a son. Lawsuits are not a pleasant experience."

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Several former KFC restaurants in Russia have reopened under brand Rostic's, as local investors fight to bring back the popular fried chicken outlets.

A 13-year-old girl is fighting for life after being hit by a car in Perth.

Shaylee Kelton was critically injured just metres from her Eden Hill home after she was struck by a car in front of her own family.

The teenager had been crossing a busy stretch of Morley Drive with a friend about 5pm on Tuesday.

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She didn't see the MG3 being driven by a P-plater until it was too late.

Her grandfather Michael Scicluna saw the crash by chance and only realised it was his granddaughter when he rushed to help.

"She was on her side and we didn't want to move her," he said.

"Everyone was saying 'do this and do that' and I just said 'no, leave her alone, I'm her grandfather'.

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"She was lying there unconscious, not moving, so I just spoke to her and spoke to her.

"The next thing she started gargling and coughed out some blood and I knew she was alive."

The teenager sustained life-altering injuries including two fractures to her skull and bleeding on the brain.

She will remain in an induced coma until the full extent of her brain injuries are clear.

Her family on Tuesday told 9News the next two days would be a waiting game.

While the incident is still being probed by major crash detectives, the girl's family has "nothing but forgiveness for the young driver".

"It was an accident, kids are kids, it happens too often," Scicluna said.

"Kids just have to be wary and be more vigilant on the roads."

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The search continues for a woman who entered a Queensland nail salon and snatched a customer's bag.

The 56-year-old client was getting her nails done at the Underwood Shopping Centre on Thursday night when her bag was pulled from beneath her.

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Video of the incident shows a staff member attempting to grab the bag back before the thief runs out of the store.

Five staff members chase after the woman, who is seen wearing a blue hoodie and dark-coloured pants.

It is believed the woman left the scene in a waiting car.

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