X to close Brazil operations due to judge’s content orders

Media platform X said on Saturday it would close its operations in Brazil “with immediate effect” due to what it called “censorship orders” issued by Brazilian judge Alexandre de Moraes.

Company X, owned by billionaire Elon Musk, claims that Moraes secretly threatened one of the company’s legal representatives in the South American country with arrest if it did not comply with an order to remove certain content from the platform.

The social media giant posted photos of a document allegedly signed by Moraes, which states that if the platform does not fully comply with Moraes’ orders, X representative Rachel Nova Conceicao will be fined 20,000 reais ($3,653) per day and an arrest warrant will be issued.

“To protect the safety of our employees, we have made the decision to immediately close our operations in Brazil,” X said.

Brazil’s Supreme Court, where Moraes sits, told Reuters it would not comment on the case and would neither confirm nor deny the authenticity of the document shared by X.

The platform said on Saturday that the X service is still available to Brazilian citizens.

Earlier this year, Moraes ordered X to block some accounts as he investigates so-called “digital militias” accused of spreading fake news and hate messages during the government of far-right former president Jair Bolsonaro.

Moraes launched an investigation into the billionaire earlier this year after Musk said he was reactivating X accounts that a judge had ordered blocked. Musk has called Moraes’ decisions regarding X “unconstitutional.”

Following Musk’s objection, X representatives changed their minds and informed Brazil’s Supreme Court that the social media giant would comply with the court’s rulings.

In April, lawyers representing X in Brazil told the Supreme Court that “operational errors” allowed users who had been ordered to have their accounts blocked to remain active on the social media platform, after Moraes asked X to explain why she allegedly did not fully comply with his decision.

Musk, in posts on X on Saturday, called Moraes “an absolute disgrace to the justice system” and said the company could not agree to the judge’s “secret censorship and private information requests.”

© Thomson Reuters 2024

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