Elon Musk’s X gives up fight in Brazil, starts complying with judge’s demands

Elon Musk is apparently conceding defeat in his fight with Brazil Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes, as the X social platform has started complying with the judge’s demands in an attempt to get the service un-blocked in the country.

X previously refused to suspend dozens of accounts accused of spreading disinformation. Internet service providers have been blocking X under orders from the government since early September, and De Moraes seized $2 million from a Starlink bank account and $1.3 million from an X account to collect on fines issued to X.

X has claimed the orders violate Brazil’s own laws. “Unlike other social media and technology platforms, we will not comply in secret with illegal orders. To our users in Brazil and around the world, X remains committed to protecting your freedom of speech,” the company said in late August.

But in a reversal detailed in a court filing on Friday night, “X’s lawyers said the company had done exactly what Mr. Musk vowed not to: take down accounts that a Brazilian justice ordered removed because the judge said they threatened Brazil’s democracy,” The New York Times reported. “X also complied with the justice’s other demands, including paying fines and naming a new formal representative in the country, the lawyers said.” (X said last month that its previous legal representative in Brazil resigned after de Moraes threatened her with imprisonment.)

X has to prove compliance

According to Reuters, “It was not immediately clear which were the accounts X has been ordered to block, as the probe is confidential.” But it has been reported that many of the accounts belonged to supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro, who was accused of instigating the January 8, 2023, attack on the Brazilian Congress after his election loss. Some of the accounts reportedly belonged to users accused of threatening federal police officers involved in a probe of Bolsonaro.

De Moraes acknowledged X’s about-face in an order issued Saturday and said that X must submit documents proving its compliance before it can be reinstated. X had an estimated 22 million users in Brazil before the suspension. Bluesky and Meta’s Threads gained users in the country after X was blocked by ISPs.

X briefly became accessible in Brazil last week after the company started routing traffic through Cloudflare, but Cloudflare subsequently made changes that let ISPs resume their blocking of X without affecting other websites that use Cloudflare. While X said it was merely “an inadvertent and temporary service restoration to Brazilian users,” de Moraes announced a new daily fine of more than $900,000 for failing to comply with the order suspending X operations in Brazil.