brazil – Techdirt (original) (raw)
Elon Rehires Lawyers In Brazil, Removes Accounts He Insisted He Wouldn’t Remove
from the was-there-no-strategy? dept
Elon Musk fought the Brazilian law, and it looks like the Brazilian law won.
After making a big show of how he was supposedly standing up for free speech, Elon caved yet again. Just as happened back in April when he first refused to comply with court orders from Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the Brazilian news org Folha reports that ExTwitter has (1) rehired a law firm in Brazil (though hasn’t yet designated a “legal representative” for the purpose of being a potential hostage) and (2) begun taking down accounts that it was ordered to remove (translated via Google Translate):
X (formerly Twitter) began complying with court orders from the Federal Supreme Court (STF) on Wednesday night (18) and took down accounts that Minister Alexandre de Moraes ordered to be suspended.
This week, the company rehired the Pinheiro Neto law firm to represent it before the Court. The firm had been dismissed last week. The STF says it will only recognize the new lawyers after X appoints a legal representative in the country.
This all comes right after the mess where ExTwitter switched its CDN provider, leading to the site briefly becoming available again in Brazil. According to Bloomberg, de Moraes appeared none too pleased about this and ordered another fine on the company:
Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who has been sparring with Musk for months, ordered a daily fine of 5 million reais ($922,250) against the social media site and accused it of attempting to “disobey” judicial orders.
An order published Thursday instructs the nation’s telecommunications regulator, Anatel, to ban X access through network providers such as Cloudflare, Fastly and EdgeUno, which were “created to circumvent the judicial decision to block the platform in national territory.”
From everything I’ve heard, it really does appear that the Cloudflare thing was unintentional and just happened because ExTwitter was in the process of moving from Fastly to Cloudflare for CDN services. This was for a variety of reasons and not to avoid the ban in Brazil. ExTwitter put out a statement saying it was unintentional as well:
You can say that the company is lying, but that wouldn’t make much sense. Elon has had zero problems antagonizing and attacking de Moraes and the Brazilian government, so it wouldn’t make sense for him to lie about this. Especially if it is true that they had already begun the process of rehiring the law firm and banning some accounts.
Cloudflare quickly announced that it would segregate ExTwitter and make sure Brazilian traffic didn’t reach it. Anyone would have had to know this was the likely result if it really was intentional.
So, all of this sounds like Elon potentially realizing that he did his “oh, look at me, I’m a free speech absolutist” schtick, it caused ExTwitter to lose a large chunk of its userbase, and now he’s back to playing ball again. Because, like so much that he’s done since taking over Twitter, he had no actual plan to deal with these kinds of demands from countries.
Filed Under: alexandre de moraes, brazil, content moderation, elon musk, hostage employees, legal representative, takedowns
Companies: twitter, x
ExTwitter’s Brazil Ban Evasion: Cloudflare’s CDN Becomes Latest Battleground
from the cat-and-mouse dept
Update: Annnnnnnnd… Cloudflare has already said it will isolate and block Brazilian IP addresses from reaching ExTwitter. Original story below.
It appears that Elon has decided to take the Brazilian hornet’s nest he’d already kicked over the last few weeks and start slamming it with a baseball bat. It’s unlikely this will end well.
I’ve been pretty clear that I don’t think either Elon Musk or Brazil look very good coming out of the fight in which ExTwitter got blocked in Brazil. The process Brazil used, while legal in that country, has some deeply problematic components regarding due process and a lack of transparency. But, at the same time, Elon’s method of handling the situation also lacks both basic diplomacy and consistency.
Musk has made it clear that he’s fine bowing down to government orders to reveal information or to block users. Indeed, he’s insisted (stupidly, but whatever) that he thinks free speech means whatever the country’s laws allow:
Just a few weeks ago, he reiterated that stance as he was fighting with Brazil.
Of course, Elon was willing to obey similar orders from Turkey and India. It’s only when he disagrees, ideologically, with the government of a country, such as Brazil, when he suddenly decides to pretend to be a free speech martyr.
Even then, there were likely better ways to protest the secret court orders that ExTwitter was receiving. However, Elon decided to continually mock and poke at the judge, Alexandre de Moraes. He posted memes of de Moraes. He made fun of him. He called him a dictator. He released what he called “the Alexandre Files” to reveal at least some of the demands that were sent to the company (though often without context).
There are principled ways to stand up for free speech and push back against excessive government demands. But it does not appear that Elon cared to bother with such an approach.
That said, Brazil’s approach has been problematic as well. There are serious due process concerns about a single Supreme Court judge being able to sign orders to block content, even if it’s possible for those orders to be reviewed by a large segment of the court at a later date. Furthermore, allowing a single judge to order a block of an entire site and/or the jailing of a local representative and/or the seizing of another company’s assets all seem problematic.
The fact that de Moraes’ original order effectively banned VPNs in the Google/Apple app stores (even if that was quickly put on temporary hold) should at least give you a sense as to how this kind of power has a high likelihood of abuse.
However, now it’s being reported that ExTwitter quietly put its service behind Cloudflare’s CDN, enabling people in Brazil to access it again, at least for a little bit.
A news release from ABRINT explains how Musk was able to outfox the country’s ban allowing people to access the platform.
It says the X app was updated overnight and the new software started using IP address linked through Cloudfare, which “makes app blocking much more complicated”.
“Unlike the previous system, which used specific, blockable IPs, the new system uses dynamic IPs that change constantly,” the news release states. “Many of these IPs are shared with other legitimate services, such as banks and large internet platforms, making it impossible to block an IP without affecting other services.”
The BBC says this is ExTwitter “outfoxing” Brazil, but it seems very unlikely to last very long.
The original order from de Moraes makes it pretty clear that all levels of infrastructure providers must stop Brazilian IP addresses from reaching ExTwitter’s services. I would imagine that, if it hasn’t already, Cloudflare will be quickly receiving a notification from Brazil’s Supreme Court that it needs to do something about this or face legal consequences.
I have no idea if Cloudflare has a legal representative in Brazil. However, that rep could face jail, since the Brazilian Supreme Court seems to enjoy putting tech company employees in jail. Alternatively, it could face fines or the nuclear option: banning all Cloudflare IPs in Brazil. That would create quite a mess for people in Brazil who want to use the internet, as a huge portion of the internet (including Techdirt) relies on Cloudflare for CDN services.
The most likely outcome is that either Cloudflare boots ExTwitter from its services or quickly works out a way to block traffic coming from Brazil from reaching the service.
Of course, this still isn’t great. I know some people who simply dislike Musk or ExTwitter will cheer on this result, but, again, consider what other countries are the ones that regularly ban apps and demand third party tech providers help them. It tends not to be the kinds of countries generally seen as big on freedoms: China, Russia, Iran, Turkey, Pakistan and more. Brazil has been big on freedom, and internet freedom specifically, over the years, so this situation isn’t great for anyone.
Either way, I trust that if Cloudflare does receive such a demand from the Brazilian Supreme Court, its response would be at least a bit more diplomatic than Elon posting AI-generated memes about de Moraes.
Filed Under: alexandre de moraes, brazil, cdn, elon musk
Companies: cloudflare, twitter, x
Ctrl-Alt-Speech: Judge, Jury And Moderator
from the ctrl-alt-speech dept
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation‘s Ben Whitelaw.
Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Pocket Casts, YouTube, or your podcast app of choice — or go straight to the RSS feed.
In this week’s round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover:
- Social networks can’t be forced to filter content for kids, says judge (The Verge)
- Judge Rejects Yet Another Attempt By Texas To Police Online Speech (Techdirt)
- Telegram apologizes for handling of deepfake porn content in S. Korea (Yonhap)
- Brazilian Supreme Court panel upholds X ban (Axios)
- Elon Musk’s Starlink backtracks to comply with Brazil’s ban on X (The Guardian)
- With Musk’s X banned in Brazil, its users carve out new digital homes (AP)
- The Internet Archive Loses Its Appeal of a Major Copyright Case (Wired)
- Posts That Include “From the River to the Sea” (Oversight Board)
This episode is brought to you with financial support from the Future of Online Trust & Safety Fund.
Filed Under: brazil, content moderation, internet archive, oversight board, pavel durov, starlink, texas
Companies: meta, spacex, telegram, twitter, x
Elon Had SpaceX Defy Brazilian Supreme Court Order To Block ExTwitter, But Then Backed Down
from the will-he-won't-he dept
In the ongoing battle between Elon Musk and the Brazilian Supreme Court, it appears that Elon was the first to blink. At least a little bit.
What started to shape up as a new front in the battle, with Elon’s SpaceX defying the order to block X on its Starlink satellite internet service, crumbled on Tuesday as SpaceX announced it would comply, though under protest (some reports claim SpaceX missed the deadline to appeal the ruling, though). Of course, that was the adults at SpaceX saying that, and it’s always possible that Elon will look to overrule them. At the time of this posting, Elon hasn’t directly commented on SpaceX’s announcement yet.
Last week, we wrote about the still ongoing battle between the Brazilian Supreme Court and Elon Musk over his refusal to remove certain content (and share some information on users) from ExTwitter. It then morphed into a fight about having a “local representative” when Elon pulled ExTwitter out of Brazil entirely, after a threat was issued with the potential to jail local employees. On Friday, we wrote about the ban order issued by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes.
The initial ban ordered basically every level of the telecom/internet infrastructure stack to ban access to ExTwitter. That included, among other things, that Apple and Google had to block it from their app stores in Brazil, that ISPs in Brazil had to block access to ExTwitter and its app, and that internet backbone and telecom providers also had to block access to ExTwitter.
There were also two more controversial parts of the ban. The first part told Apple and Google that they had to also block access to VPNs that might allow users to get around the bans. A later part threatened massive fines on Brazilians caught getting around the ban by any means, including using a VPN. A few hours after the initial order was released, Moraes backed down on the first part, temporarily suspending the order that Apple and Google block VPNs, though the fine for users still stood. Many people incorrectly thought that part was rescinded as well.
On Monday, the Supreme Court upheld the overall ban. Moraes said that the ban on personal use for VPNs would only be enforced for users who sought to “engage in conduct that defrauds the court decision,” which seems somewhat broad and open to interpretation. One other judge wanted to limit the individual fines only to users who got around the ban and used it to post racist or fascist supporting content, but that request did not receive the necessary support from the other judges.
Still, there is an interesting element in all of this. Another of Elon’s offerings, Starlink from SpaceX, is one of those ISPs that would need to block access to ExTwitter in order to comply with the order. Given that Moraes had already started freezing SpaceX assets, it’s no surprise that Musk basically told Brazilian regulators he wasn’t going to abide by the blocking order either, according to the NY Times:
On Sunday, Starlink informed Brazil’s telecom agency, Anatel, that it would not block X until Brazilian officials released Starlink’s frozen assets, Anatel’s president, Carlos Baigorri, said in an interview broadcast by the Brazilian outlet Globo News.
Mr. Baigorri said he had received that response from Starlink’s lawyers. “Let’s wait and see if they formalize this in the records,” he said.
Mr. Baigorri said he had informed Justice Moraes “so that he can take the measures he deems appropriate.” Mr. Baigorri said his agency could revoke Starlink’s license to operate in Brazil, which would “hypothetically” prevent the company from offering connections to its Brazilian customers.
However, just a little while ago, Starlink announced that it was going to comply with the order, though it is doing so under protest. It posted to ExTwitter:
To our customers in Brazil (who may not be able to read this as a result of X being blocked by @alexandre):
The Starlink team is doing everything possible to keep you connected.
Following last week’s order from @alexandre that froze Starlink’s finances and prevents Starlink from conducting financial transactions in Brazil, we immediately initiated legal proceedings in the Brazilian Supreme Court explaining the gross illegality of this order and asking the Court to unfreeze our assets. Regardless of the illegal treatment of Starlink in freezing of our assets, we are complying with the order to block access to X in Brazil.
We continue to pursue all legal avenues, as are others who agree that @alexandre’s recent orders violate the Brazilian constitution.
There’s at least a bit of irony here, given that Elon’s famous “sorry to be a free speech absolutist” line came in saying he would not block news sources “unless at gunpoint.”
I guess he sees Brazil as holding a gun.
This came just a day after Elon posted wildly about why the US should seize Brazilian government assets in response to Brazil seizing Starlink assets. This was after Elon saw reports of the US seizing Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s airplane.
Of course, it is meaningless to declare that “Unless the Brazilian government returns the illegally seized property of 𝕏 and SpaceX, we will seek reciprocal seizure of government assets too. Hope Lula enjoys flying commercial…” given that Elon is not in the government. However, if his preferred candidate, Donald Trump, wins, I wouldn’t be surprised to see an attempt to help his financial backer on this one.
Starlink represents an interesting leverage point in all of this. It has been used in Brazil for a few years now, including by some in the government. But, as NY Times’ Jack Nicas (who covers tech in Brazil) noted earlier this week, when it launched in Brazil, Elon pledged to hook up 19,000 Brazilian schools with Starlink.
Apparently that never actually happened. But it didn’t stop Elon from just retweeting someone claiming that it had happened.
Either way, this situation and Elon Musk’s vast empire make some of this stuff way more complicated than most any other comparable scenario.
It also seems unlikely to end here. Remember that the current fight is a follow-on to the fight back in April when ExTwitter at first refused to remove some content that Moraes demanded, then quietly backed down… only to then change its mind again later.
Indeed, there are reports coming out of Brazil as I finish this article saying that Moraes is ordering more Starlink seizures which could potentially impact users’ ability to even use the service at all. It’s unclear on the timing of that with regards to Starlink saying it would comply with the blocking. But since the seizures are more about punishing Musk for not complying with ExTwitter, rather than about Starlink itself, it seems likely that these will move forward.
Filed Under: alexandre de moraes, blocking, brazil, elon musk, seizing assets
Companies: spacex, twitter, x
Brazil Bans ExTwitter In Battle With Musk, Takes VPNs & Users Down With It
from the everything-about-this-story-is-terrible dept
In the battle between Elon Musk and Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the biggest losers are Brazilians. They are now at risk of being stripped of VPNs while facing massive fines if they somehow get around a countrywide ban on ExTwitter.
Yesterday, I wrote about the standoff between Elon Musk and Brazil, and how neither side comes out of it looking very good. Where it was left was that Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes was (1) freezing Starlink assets and (2) threatening to ban ExTwitter entirely from the country.
As we noted, there was nothing particularly new about the second point. Brazil has done this in the past with WhatsApp and Telegram. The freezing of Starlink’s assets already appeared to be an overreach and suggested how far Moraes would be willing to go in this posturing battle.
Apparently, he was willing to go even further, to the point of potentially blocking VPNs entirely.
On Friday, it was announced that ExTwitter would indeed be banned across Brazil. But what may be most interesting (or, rather, scary) is the method. First, ISPs and app stores have been ordered to block access to the app within five days. That’s not all that new, even if it is generally problematic. Countries simply should not be banning apps on the open internet.
But then it gets worse. The original ruling said that app stores are also told they need to ban VPNs. Here’s a translation of the order.
(2.1) APPLE and GOOGLE in Brazil to insert technological obstacles capable of making it impossible for users of the IOS (APPLE) and ANDROID (GOOGLE) systems to use the “X” application and remove the “X” application from the APPLE STORE and GOOGLE PLAY STORE stores and, similarly, in relation to applications that enable the use of VPN (‘virtual private network’), such as, for example: Proton VPN, Express VPN, NordVPN, Surfshark, TOTALVPN, Atlas VPN, Bitdefender VPN;
(2.2) That manage backbone access services in Brazil, so that they insert technological obstacles capable of making it impossible for users of the “X” application to use it;
(2.3) Internet service providers, represented by their Presidents, such as ALGAR TELECOM, OI, SKY, LIVE TIM, VIVO, CLARO, NET VIRTUA, GVT, etc…, to insert technological obstacles capable of making the use of the “X” application unfeasible; and
(2.4) Those who manage personal mobile service and switched fixed telephone service, to insert technological obstacles capable of making the use of the “X” application unfeasible;
I initially thought that first section couldn’t possibly mean that app stores also had to ban VPNs. But that’s what it pretty clearly says and what multiple Brazilian reports claim.
The end result is taking away VPNs from millions of Brazilians, which is an awful lot of collateral damage just because Elon Musk is a jackass. VPNs have many legitimate uses other than accessing ExTwitter after a ban in Brazil.
A few hours after the decision, Moraes seemed to walk back that section of the ruling, though perhaps only temporarily. In a second short ruling, he “suspended the execution” of that item “until there is a statement from the parties in the proceedings” in order to “avoid any unnecessary and reversible inconvenience to third-party companies.”
In other words, after Moraes hears from “the parties in the proceedings,” the VPN ban could come back. It’s unclear if that’s just ExTwitter, or if Apple/Google are included, given they were the ones directed to block VPNs.
Then, the original order (in a part that has not been rescinded) also threatens to fine anyone who is able to get around the block nearly $9,000 dollars per day:
(3) THE APPLICATION OF A DAILY FINE of R$50,000.00 (fifty thousand reais) to individuals and legal entities that engage in conduct involving the use of technological subterfuges to continue communications carried out by “X”, such as the use of VPN (‘virtual private network’), without prejudice to other civil and criminal sanctions, as provided by law.
When Brazil tried banning Telegram recently, this element was in there too, with the fines being twice as high. Though apparently it was never used.
Either way, this got a lot of attention very quickly. The NY Times notes that civil society folks are spooked by the VPN demands:
“This is the first time they asked for VPN blocking. This is something unprecedented,” Paula Bernardi, a Brazil-based policy adviser at the Internet Society, which pushes for an open internet. She said the Brazilian government could potentially now ask VPN providers to reveal who used their services to access X. “That’s going to be a very heated debate,” she said.
I was already concerned about the efforts by Moraes here, even if Elon is being terrible in response. But it’s fucking crazy that he ordered Google and Apple to ban VPNs entirely and then also threatened huge fines to users of VPNs (even if there’s a low likelihood of it being enforced).
One other oddity in all this is that Apple apparently started banning VPNs from its iOS App Store last week, perhaps knowing this order was coming. But that only raises even more questions. Did Apple know the details of this “unprecedented” order a week early? Why would it agree to ban VPNs?
As I said on today’s Ctrl-Alt-Speech, neither side looks good here. Now that it’s turned into a kind of schoolyard fight between Moraes and Musk where each one seems to be going further and further to piss off the other, it’s getting worse and worse for the public. Indeed, I’ve seen some speculation that Moraes doesn’t even have the authority to issue such a widespread ban on VPNs, but no one seems to be stopping him either way.
This is no longer about policy or law. It’s just become about egos. And because of that, everyone loses*.
* With the possible exception of Bluesky, which has had a flood of users from Brazil in the past two days. I will remind people that I am on the board of Bluesky, but this is not how I want Bluesky to gain new users. Bluesky itself has many advantages, including that it would be much more difficult to “ban” the service like this given its decentralized nature. But seeing pissing matches between Musk and Brazil seems like an unfortunate way for it to get more attention.
Filed Under: alexandre de moraes, app stores, ban, brazil, countrywide block, elon musk, vpns
Companies: apple, google, twitter, x
Ctrl-Alt-Speech: The Platform To Prison Pipeline
from the ctrl-alt-speech dept
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation‘s Ben Whitelaw.
Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Pocket Casts, YouTube, or your podcast app of choice — or go straight to the RSS feed.
In this week’s round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover:
- TikTok must face a lawsuit for recommending the viral ‘blackout challenge’ (The Verge)
- Third Circuit’s Section 230 TikTok Ruling Deliberately Ignores Precedent, Defies Logic (Techdirt)
- France charges Telegram CEO Pavel Durov, releases him on €5M bail (Politico)
- Elon Musk’s X could face ban in Brazil after failure to appoint legal representative (The Guardian)
- Zuckerberg says he regrets caving to White House pressure on content (Politico)
This episode is brought to you with financial support from the Future of Online Trust & Safety Fund.
Filed Under: brazil, content moderation, donald trump, mark zuckerberg, pavel durov, section 230, third circuit
Companies: telegram, tiktok, twitter, x
Elon’s Standoff With Brazil Reveals Hypocrisy & Overreach By Both Sides
from the none-of-this-looks-good-for-anyone dept
In the battle between Elon Musk and Brazil, there are no heroes — only two sides engaged in an epic display of hypocrisy and overreach.
You may have heard that Brazil is threatening to ban ExTwitter from the country, possibly by tonight. This comes after Elon said that it was shutting down all operations in Brazil as the judiciary there continued to demand the company remove content that Elon didn’t want to remove. We wrote about some of the backstory in April, when Elon first said he was not going to obey the orders issued by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes.
The orders focused on supporters of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, a very Trumpian figure. His supporters had tried to pull a similar “storming the Congress” kind of move in January of 2023, which was about as successful as the Trumpian storming of the US Capitol two years earlier. Moraes had ordered both that ExTwitter share information on some users who were talking about the storming of the Brazilian Congress, and that some of the accounts be blocked.
What was less reported was that a few days later, ExTwitter quietly agreed that it would comply with the order. But then… it appears it did not. So, more recently, Moraes suggested that he would order ExTwitter’s legal representative in Brazil to be jailed for failure to comply. This is when Elon said they were pulling all operations out of the country.
Now Moraes has responded by saying that Brazil might just ban all of ExTwitter in the country in response.
None of this is unprecedented. We’ve talked in the past about Brazil arresting Facebook officials because WhatsApp wouldn’t reveal info on certain users (because it couldn’t, due to encryption) and then banning WhatsApp (multiple times). So we’ve seen this before.
Either way, Elon does not seem to be taking it well. He posted an image of Moraes in jail, which I’m sure is not winning him many fans among Moraes’ supporters.
In response, there are reports suggesting that Moraes is also looking to freeze Starlink’s assets in Brazil. Of course, Starlink had just received a bunch of press for how it was being used by remote Amazon tribes.
In discussing this on Bluesky, I suggested that both sides are coming out of this looking extremely badly and got pushback, mainly from Brazilians and some people who dislike Musk.
The main argument is that it’s pretty clear that he is violating Brazilian law. First off, it involves disobeying orders coming from the Brazilian Supreme Court, which people insist must be obeyed. Also, the law in Brazil requires that to operate an internet service, you have to have an employee in the country.
But, here’s the thing: as we’ve argued for years, standing up and fighting back against unjust laws is what standing up for free speech and civil liberties is all about.
For example, lots of countries are now pushing for these laws that require internet companies to have local employees in order to arrest them if the company doesn’t do the government’s bidding. We have long pointed out how dangerous this is, as they are effectively “hostage laws” that enable authoritarian countries to put undue pressure on private companies.
Even if you claim that Brazil is somehow not authoritarian, blessing these kinds of laws enables authoritarian countries to use similar laws in similarly problematic ways. Are you okay with Russia having the same law (it does)? Or India?
Indeed, let’s look at what happened in India under Twitter’s previous regime as a comparison. Remember, Modi’s government had demanded that Twitter remove a bunch of tweets supportive of a massive protest by farmers in that country, and Twitter refused. The Indian government (like Moraes in Brazil) claimed at the time that the protests were threatening the stability of the Indian government.
When Twitter refused to pull down those tweets, the Modi government first threatened to jail Indian Twitter employees. Later, it raided Twitter’s offices in India. India threatened to ban Twitter in the country, and some politicians pushed Indians to move to a local competitor, Koo. Twitter fought back against those demands, and many people cheered them on for standing up for free speech and against undue pressure.
I don’t see how you separate these two stories. If Twitter was right to stand up to India when the Modi government made those demands, shouldn’t it stand up to Brazil when it makes similar demands? Isn’t that standing up for free speech?
The fact that Brazil has a hostage law, or that it has a law saying a single Supreme Court justice can demand content be removed, or that it can block a service entirely, or that same justice can freeze other unrelated assets… those are all bad? Those all seem like unjust powers that shouldn’t be allowed as they can easily be abused. Also, many of the original demands were secret, and if you are going to give a government the power to pull down content, the fact that those orders are secret is very concerning.
At the same time, yes, it appears that Elon is fighting all this in a dumb and antagonistic way. Making use of proper legal process upfront makes a lot more sense. Attacking the judge in question directly seems… unwise?
This is why I was saying that both sides look bad here. Musk also looks bad because of his selectiveness. Remember, he keeps claiming that his definition of free speech is “that which matches the law.”
He literally said it again earlier this week:
He notes that he wants ExTwitter to “support all viewpoints within the bounds of the laws of countries.”
Yet, here, he is against the laws in Brazil. At the very least, this highlights again how even Elon Musk doesn’t agree with Elon Musk’s definition of free speech, because it’s nonsensical. Supporting free speech sometimes means you have to stand up against unjust laws.
And, of course, as a reminder, before Elon took over Twitter (but while he was in a legal fight about it), he accused the company of violating the agreement because of its legal fight against the Modi government over their censorship demands. I know it’s long forgotten now, but one of the excuses Elon used in trying to kill the Twitter deal was that the company was fighting too hard to protect free speech in India.
And then, once he took over, he not only caved immediately to Modi’s demands, he agreed to block the content that the Modi government ordered blocked globally, not just in India.
So Elon isn’t even consistent on this point. He folds to governments when he likes the leadership and fights them when he doesn’t. It’s not a principled stance. It’s a cynical, opportunistic one.
But in the end, both sides look bad here. Elon’s response is childish and inconsistent with his own statements and actions elsewhere. And Brazil’s laws seem unjust, and its enforcement of the law seems extremely out of proportion with the alleged violations.
In the end, the real people who lose out are those in Brazil who have relied on ExTwitter as a useful service.
Filed Under: alexandre de moraes, brazil, elon musk, free speech, hostage employees, hostage laws
Companies: starlink, twitter, x
Ctrl-Alt-Speech: Watch Out, AI Is Getting More Persuasive
from the ctrl-alt-speech dept
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly podcast about the latest news in online speech, from Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation‘s Ben Whitelaw.
Subscribe now on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify, Pocket Casts, YouTube, or your podcast app of choice — or go straight to the RSS feed.
In this week’s round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by guest host Alice Hunsberger, VP of Trust and Safety and Content Moderation at Partnerhero and former Global Head of Customer Experience at Grindr. Together they cover:
- Measuring the Persuasiveness of Language Models (Anthropic)
- Our Approach to Labeling AI-Generated Content and Manipulated Media (Meta)
- Survey: New Laws Mandate Access To Social Media Data, But Obstacles Remain (Tech Policy Press)
- Brazil Might Regulate All Social Media After Clash With Elon Musk (Guardian)
- X automatically changed ‘Twitter’ to ‘X’ in users’ posts, breaking legit URLs (Mashable)
- LinkedIn starts verifying recruiters to stop scams (Axios)
- Content policy is basically astrology? (T&S Insider from Everything in Moderation)
The episode is brought to you with financial support from the Future of Online Trust & Safety Fund.
Filed Under: ai, alice hunsberger, artificial intelligence, brazil, content moderation
Companies: linkedin, meta, twitter, x
Elon Finally Finds A Government He’s Willing To Stand Up To: When The Censorship Demands Target His Political Allies
from the it's-not-principles-when-it-only-helps-your-buddies dept
Over the last few years, Elon Musk has repeatedly said that his definition of free speech means “that which matches the law.”
He says this whenever anyone calls out that he’s not actually the free speech absolutist he claims to be. He regularly and expeditiously caves in to censorship demands, without any protest, from authoritarian governments in places like India and Turkey. When those governments demand Musk remove speech of government critics, his response is to do so immediately (and in the case of India, globally) while insisting that nothing can be done, he’s just following the laws.
However, there’s now a big story brewing in Brazil. Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes is demanding the removal of content that was spreading nonsense in support of former President Jair Bolsonaro. This is regarding the Brazilian equivalent of the January 6th storming of the Capitol in the US, when Bolsonaro supporters stormed the Brazilian Congress on January 8, 2023.
ExTwitter originally agreed to take down the content, but Musk reversed that decision.
That’s a post from ExTwitter’s global affairs team saying at 2:52pm on April 6th:
X Corp. has been forced by court decisions to block certain popular accounts in Brazil. We have informed those accounts that we have taken this action.
We do not know the reasons these blocking orders have been issued. We do not know which posts are alleged to violate the law.
We are prohibited from saying which court or judge issued the order, or on what grounds.
We are prohibited from saying which accounts are impacted. We are threatened with daily fines if we fail to comply.
We believe that such orders are not in accordance with the Marco Civil da Internet or the Brazilian Federal Constitution, and we challenge the orders legally where possible.
The people of Brazil, regardless of their political beliefs, are entitled to freedom of speech, due process, and transparency from their own authorities.
Less than one hour later, Musk announced the decision was lifted.
To be absolutely clear: I applaud this decision by Musk to finally stand up to a nonsense, censorial government demand. It’s about time he did so. It’s just notable that he only seems to have done it when it came in support of Jair Bolsonaro, a right-wing extremist. And it never happens when the demands are coming from right-wing extremist governments.
It’s almost as if Musk’s support of free speech is highly conditional. Which is the same thing as saying he’s not a free speech supporter at all. He simply supports those he aligns with politically and pushes back against those he disagrees with politically.
For what it’s worth, we’ve highlighted Brazil’s slip-sliding down the slope of censorship before. We mentioned this very Alexandre de Moraes, back when he was a government minister. Indeed, de Moraes has built up a reputation as a censorial asshat. So I’m glad that someone is pushing back. But it sure does seem quite selective by Musk.
When he says “we follow the laws of the country,” it’s noteworthy when he follows through on that, and when he suddenly pretends to take a stand for free speech.
Meanwhile, Musk made sure to play to his fans who believe he’s always willing to stand up for free speech. He did this by directly replying to de Moraes on ExTwitter asking why he was demanding so much “censorship” in Brazil (de Moraes’ tweet has nothing to do with any of this).
In response, de Moraes announced an “investigation” into Musk.
Musk has said that he will continue to fight this, even if it means having to pull out of Brazil altogether:
If, as Musk says, “principles matter more than profit,” then how does he square that with the fact that he was willing to comply basically everywhere else? Remember, a study from last year found that Elon complied with over 80% of government takedown requests, significantly up from the around 50% under the old regime.
So, seriously, it’s great that Elon is fighting this one particularly problematic judge. But the fact remains that he caves basically everywhere else and throws up a nonsense “we believe in complying with the laws.” Except in this case.
That’s not principles. It’s supporting friends. Which is anything but being a free speech supporter.
Filed Under: alexandre de moraes, brazil, censorship, elon musk, free speech
Companies: twitter, x
Brazil’s Governments Amps Up Anti-Free Speech Tactics Ahead Of National Election
from the gotta-keep-the-public-in-check-if-you-want-to-keep-on-winning dept
The Brazilian government — under the “leadership” of Donald Trump Mutual Admiration Society member Jair Bolsonaro — has been steadily cracking down on free speech under the guise of saving the public from “fake news” and other misinformation.
Over the past few years, it has ramped up efforts to eradicate content and reporting that it calls “fake news,” a term that refers to criticism of the ruling party, criticism of the ruling party’s efforts, punching holes in official narratives, or debunking the ruling party’s favored conspiracy theories.
In early 2018, it handed over the job of policing social media platforms to the actual police. The federal police were given permission to bring guns to a word fight to ensure compliance with demands that anything the government declared “fake” be removed as close to immediately as possible. The federal police seemed to relish this new directive, stating that it would continue to police social media whether or not the proposed censorship law was passed by Brazil’s government.
Since then, even more mandates have been handed down to social media services to make it easier for the government to track and trace critics and dissidents. A 2020 “fake news” proposal would have forced service providers to collect and retain a ton of data and metadata indefinitely for examination by the government (which means the federal police) whenever it felt something was “fake” and/or (even more vaguely) threatened national security.
In 2021, the legislation was altered to remove logging requirements and the collection of users’ national ID information before allowing them to open accounts. While that aspect of the proposed legislation got a bit better, the rest of the “fake news” law got much, much worse. It mandated unmasking of users by social media services, granted the government permission to simply shut down troublesome parts of the internet to quell dissent, and allowed the government to pretend IP addresses alone were capable of accurately identifying users who spread so-called “fake news.”
Ahead of a runoff election between far right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro and his opponent, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Brazil’s government has granted itself an expansion of censorship powers and increased its direct policing of social media content.
The Superior Electoral Court (TSE) unanimously approved rules to maintain the integrity of the upcoming electoral process by fighting against the spread of misinformation that may compromise the fierce presidential campaign between far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro and leftist challenger Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, as well as the elections overall.
The president of the TSE, Minister Alexandre de Moraes, declared that once the collegiate decides that a particular post contains disinformation content, it will be removed, together with all other identical publications. He emphasized that after “[v]erifying that that content has been repeated, there will be no need for a new representation or judicial decision, there will be an extension and immediate withdrawal of these fraudulent news.”
While the involvement of the court suggests an impartial review of alleged “fake news,” the increasing focus on what President Bolsonaro believes is fake news suggests something else. The court is here to serve the laws that are in place, rather than simply protect the citizens of Brazil from government overreach.
There is no carrot for social media services. Only a very expensive stick. Content the court declares illegal needs to be removed within two hours. Services face fines of $19,000/hour for every hour (I assume pro-rated fines are also in place) the content remains visible past that point.
The laws Bolsonaro thought might deter criticism of him and his party are now being used against him, which is its own form of justice, I guess. But it is also limiting political debate and appears to be restricting journalists from reporting on the candidates’ sordid pasts/presents.
The TSE has already ordered some disinformation videos to be taken down, including ones that say Lula consorts with Satan and Bolsonaro embraces cannibalism. The campaigns have also been ordered by the court to pull online ads saying the leftist will legalize abortion and the incumbent entertains pedophilia.
[…]
The Bolsonaro camp has complained that the TSE has told it not to run ads calling Lula “corrupt” and a “thief” because bribery convictions that put him in jail were later annulled by the Supreme Court.
Brazilian broadcasters have also said they have been prohibited from using the words “ex-convict,” “thief” or “corrupt” when speaking about Lula. The broadcaster lobby ABERT protested that such decisions were interfering with freedom of expression.
By contrast, Bolsonaro allies complain that the TSE has not stopped opponents from accusing the president of “genocide” for his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic that killed 680,000 Brazilians.
Fun stuff all around. An authoritarian is learning what terrible laws can do when you’re forced to allow your political opponents to avail themselves of the same (dubious) protections. Unfortunately, it’s not just the party in power or the party planning to take power by accusing opponents of cannibalism that are being constrained here. The fines and additional scrutiny are likely provoking proactive content moderation by platforms, which means content that isn’t technically illegal is being buried because it cuts too close the vague language of the law. And journalists are finding it more difficult to report on candidates because the court has declared some words off limits.
Even if Bolsonaro is finding himself a bit hamstrung by his own legal mandates, he at least has to be happy it’s resulted in a pretty effective chilling effect on social media services and journalism outlets. Not every win is a blowout. But a win, no matter how ugly, is still a win.
Filed Under: brazil, elections, fake news, free speech, jair bolsonaro