That's it from us here on the blog today. Thank you for following along with us as we worked through the files. 

As we close out the day, here's a quick recap of how things unfolded: 

• In the early hours of this morning, the US Department of Justice published more than 3 million files from its investigations into Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell
• Given today was still only a partial release of the department's files, Democrats released statements slamming the government
• A joint statement by 20 of Epstein's survivors said today's release exposed abuse victims to public scrutiny under the garb of "transparency"

If you're just tuning in, a team of our journalists spent the day combing through the release and shared their notable finds here in the blog. 

Several high-profile names were turned up in today's release.

Here are some of the key pieces of evidence we uncovered: 

• An email thread of tips sent to the FBI revealed the details of several allegations made against US President Donald Trump
• A spokesperson on behalf of tech billionaire Bill Gates said claims Epstein made against him in an email thread were "absured and completely false"
• In emails to Epstein, Tesla and X boss Elon Musk discussed partying on the financier's island 
• Other email chains revealed Epstein was providing advice on Trump to the Saudi Royal Court
• Katherine Keating, the daughter of former prime minister Paul Keating, offered to bring her younger sister to a dinner party held by Epstein
• Woody Allen joked about his friendship with Epstein in text messages, which appeared to hint at the filmmaker knowing the financier abused young girls

You can look back on the entire day's events below, and if you'd like to access the files for yourself, you can do so here.

Katherine Keating, the daughter of former prime minister Paul Keating, has released a statement to the Nine newspapers after more emails between her and Epstein surfaced in the latest DoJ release.

In it she says it was "unfortunate" former prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor had introduced her to Epstein.

The emails appear to show Keating and Epstein had a social relationship lasting several years between 2010 and 2013, during which she attended parties at his home and he acted as a kind of mentor or business coach.

In the statement, Keating says she was initially interested in Epstein's businesses connections.

"Having just arrived in New York and being invited to a dinner party by Andrew, populated by leading media and business figures, was of course of interest to me," she says.

"Any follow-up contact, including emails with him or his staff, was simply viewed by me as an opportunity to meet reputable and major leaders of American business, to open career opportunities of a kind I would have not otherwise have had. I had absolutely no other reason to have anything to do with Epstein."

She says she did not visit Epstein's island nor travel on his plane and never witnessed any inappropriate behaviour, according to the SMH reports.

She also had no knowledge of the criminal conduct that has come to light since their contact ended.

Ultimately, Epstein and his staff's "persistence bordering on harassment" led to her severing contact, she says.

"The rest of the trail of inconsequential emails from Epstein simply go to Epstein's manic interest in following up any person whom he met or crossed paths with," Keating says. 

"This is why there are so many emails in the administration's release of them."

Among the documents released today are photos of the cell where Jeffrey Epstein was found unresponsive before his death on August 10, 2019.

He was found by Metropolitan Correctional Centre staff at 6:30am and later died in hospital. 

The FBI ruled his death a suicide, concluding there was no criminal involvement.

Hi Drew, 

That's exactly right — they're like big volumes of varying sizes. 

There tends to be some themes around what's included in each set. 

Data Set 11, for example, contains a lot of correspondences from Jeffrey Epstein's former assistant Lesley Groff as she organised travel itineraries. 

Other sets in the past have centred around themes such as Epstein's death in his prison cell, or police files from investigations into Epstein in the 1990s and 2000s.

But there's still plenty of crossover between these data sets — they're not perfectly organised. 

It's difficult to say for certain what the Department of Justice's process was when compiling its files for publication, though.

If you've been following along with the Epstein files releases, you might be familiar with the Department of Justice's method for uploads. 

They typically come folders at a time, in what the department calls "data sets". 

Earlier this morning, we finally got the massive Data Sets 9 through 11, which is what we've been working through today. 

Just now, the department unceremoniously published Data Set 12. 

A quick scan of the documents inside has revealed some photos reportedly taken by Ghislaine Maxwell at Oak Bluffs Harbor in the Hamptons. 

It's not clear whether the people pictured are victims of Epstein and Maxwell — the Department of Justice has redacted the identities of all women and girls in photos, except for Maxwell.

In a text thread with Jeffrey Epstein, filmmaker and actor Woody Allen appears to hint at knowing about the sex offender's abuse of young girls. 

Allen: "Our business office said if you make out the check to me it looks very bad because then it looks like a gift to me. I don't want to be one of your women or should I say girls. I would be much more expensive than that. You wouldn't be able to afford me. Is this one of the times when you're not thrilled to be my friend?" 

Epstein: "Yes the price t pay would definitely be too high. I never waiver re friends." 

Allen: "I think this will be a beautiful friendship then." 

Epstein: "As long as I follow orders:)" 

Allen: "Woody says the exact same thing but in a dirtier away. Way." 

Epstein: "What did he say?"

Allen: "Are you kidding? I can't put it in writing. You wish you knew." 

The exchange finishes with Allen thanking Epstein for a watch that has "already come in handy". 

If you're just tuning in, here's a quick rundown of what's going on. 

The US Department of Justice (DOJ) has published a new tranche of files from the investigations into Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. 

It comes weeks after a legally mandated deadline for the department to release all its documents relating to the case. 

We have a team of journalists poring through the evidence now, and we're sharing our notable finds here, in addition to key reactions and developments. 

It's important to note that a person's name or image appearing in these documents does not necessarily imply any wrongdoing. 

Several people who have featured in releases have denied any involvement in Epstein's crimes. 

The Department of Justice has said some of the documents may contain untrue and senastionalist claims.

 If you'd like to access the files for yourself, you can do so here.

I mentioned below that Jeffrey Epstein had sent a genetics testing kit to the assistant of an advisor to the Saudi Royal Court. 

The financier had a contact at 23andMe, who he often contacted to organise shipments of dozens of kits at a time. 

Woody Allen and his wife, Soon-Yi, as well as Noam Chomsky and his wife Valeria were among those to receive kits. 

In a text message thread, a person whose name has been redacted asks Epstein "what specifically you're looking for in [Soon-Yi's] data. 

[Redacted]: "All I could find was percentages of how korean she was, etc. No actual ancestors or connections were found." 

Epstein: "Go to 23 and Me website. Sign in. Go to her relative page." 

In another exchange, Epstein tells Serbian fashion designer Boris Nikolić his results had been uploaded. 

"Results came back from 23 and Me, amazing, lets (sic) talk today," he writes. 

Epstein also went to great lengths to ship 30 kits to Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem, the billionaire chairman of Dubai's state-owned port operator DP World, circumventing laws that prevented the kits from being used outside of the US. 

The ABC's North American correspondent, Kamin Gock, says the Epstein scandal will continue to impact Trump's second term, due to the scale of documents withheld. 

"Whilst 3 million pages of documents have been released today, he [Deputy Attorney-General Todd Blanche] revealed that they'd identified more than 6 million pages."

He explains that Democrats and survivors are therefore not satisfied with the information released, meaning the "issue will continue to stick on Donald Trump's second term".

"Already Democrats and survivors are criticising the DOJ and asking why millions of documents are being withheld from the public.

"It's evident this issue is not going away."

In my previous post, I delved into part of Jeffrey Epstein's texting relationship with an advisor to the Saudi Royal Court. 

There are plenty more email chains with Raafat Abdulla Saad Al Sabbagh to dig through. 

At one stage, in October 2016, Epstein floated the "radical" idea of forming two new cryptocurrencies. One would be called "the sharia". 

"The Middle East could have its own sharia ... for internal use amongst Muslims," he wrote to Al Sabbagh and his assistant, Aziza Al Ahmadi. 

"I have spoken to some of the founders of Bitcoin who are very excited." 

About seven months later, Epstein's assistant reached out to Al Ahmadi on his behalf to send a genetics test kit.