A Brazilian judge has officially banned X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, bringing the monthslong conflict between Elon Musk and Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes to a head. On August 30th, Justice de Moraes handed down the order and notified the country's communications agency to limit access to the platform within 24 hours.
The Brazilian justice, who has led the country's efforts against misinformation, opened an investigation into X in April after Musk said he reactivated accounts the platform was ordered to block.
Musk later closed X's offices in Brazil over claims de Moraes threatened to arrest the company's local legal representative if the platform didn't follow "censorship orders." Despite Justice de Moraes warning that Brazil would ban X if it didn't appoint a new legal representative, Musk still hasn't complied, leading to the platform's suspension.
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X is currently banned in Brazil following an order from a Supreme Court justice, and Brazilian users seem to be turning to Bluesky, an alternate social network, in droves.
"Brazil, you're setting new all-time-highs for activity on Bluesky!" the official Bluesky account says in a post.
A judge in Brazil has ordered the suspension of X after owner Elon Musk failed to designate a new legal representative for the country, according to reports from Bloomberg and local news outlet Poder360.
Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes told the National Telecommunications Agency (Anatel) to limit access to X within 24 hours and has given Apple and Google five days to remove X from their mobile app stores. The country will also impose daily fines of $50,000 Brazilian real (~$8,900 USD) to people who try to access X through a virtual private network (VPN), as reported by Poder360.
Brazil has opened an investigation into Elon Musk over a potential obstruction of justice after the X owner said he reactivated accounts on the social media platform Brazil had ordered the platform to block.
The inquiry opened by Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes on Sunday follows a string of heated interactions between Musk and the Brazilian government. On Saturday, X's global government affairs team announced that "court decisions" had forced the platform to block "certain popular accounts" in Brazil and would face daily fines (of up to $20,000, according to The Associated Press) if it failed to comply.
