Brazil suspends X, what next for Elon Musk
Rio de Janeiro: Supreme Court of Brazil Friday banned social media platform X after its owner and CEO Elon Musk refused to appoint a legal representative for the social network and comply with the court orders to suspend certain accounts.
Rio de Janeiro: Supreme Court of Brazil Friday banned social media platform X after its owner and CEO Elon Musk refused to appoint a legal representative for the social network and comply with the court orders to suspend certain accounts.
The ban on X by the top court of Latin America’s largest country comes after a month-long standoff over disinformation.
In an order pronounced Friday, Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered the "immediate, complete and comprehensive suspension of the operation of" X in Brazil and asked the country's communications agency to take "all necessary measures" to implement the order.
The judge also ordered a fine of 50,000 reais ($8,900) if anyone is found using "technological subterfuges" to get around the block, such as Virtual Private Network (VPN).
The Brazilian Supreme Court also said the suspension would remain until all related court orders on X were complied with, including the payment of fines amounting to 18.5 million reais ($3.28 million), which he had previously slapped on the social media network for ignoring judicial orders.
The order will also be valid until a representative of the company in the country is appointed, he said.
The court also ordered to freeze the financial assets of Musk's Starlink by blocking the accounts of the satellite internet network that has rapidly expanded its subscriptions in Brazil.
Musk responds
X said that it viewed Justice Moraes’s sealed orders as illegal and that it planned to publish them.
“Free speech is the bedrock of democracy and an unelected pseudo-judge in Brazil is destroying it for political purposes,” Elon Musk wrote on X.
Musk had earlier closed X’s office in Brazil after Justice Moraes threatened arrests for ignoring his orders to remove X accounts that he said broke Brazilian laws.
Amid the escalation with Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the outspoken American billionaire compared the judge to Harry Potter villain Lord Voldemort, and accused him of "illegally censoring" conservative voices.
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