Today, after a month-long suspension, X is now live again in Brazil. The platform had been suspended since late August following a showdown with the country's Supreme Court, in which X refused a court order to remove certain right-wing accounts and content that the court found violated Brazilian law. After weeks of non-compliance, it appears Elon Musk has relented.
Brazilian Supreme Court judge Alexandre de Moraes authorized X's return after the company blocked profiles accused of spreading false information, reappointed a legal representative in the country and paid fines of up to 28 .6 million reais (5.1 million dollars).
X issued a statement on its platform, saying it is “proud to return to Brazil.” “Giving tens of millions of Brazilians access to our indispensable platform has been critical throughout this process,” the statement said. “We will continue to defend freedom of expression, within the limits of the law, wherever we operate.”
“I think what he ultimately saw was that he had no choice,” said Nina Santos, a digital democracy researcher at Brazil's National Institute of Science & Technology who studies the far right in Brazil. “And people in Brazil just started not to care about it anymore.”
Shortly after Musk acquired the former Twitter in October 2022, the company received a consent decree from Brazil's court, threatening a ban if it failed to deliver on its promises to curb election-related misinformation and disinformation during the country's presidential election . off. According to employees who spoke to WIRED at the time, the trust and safety staff were able to convince Musk to maintain Twitter's policies and guardrails. But less than two weeks later, Musk fired more than half of the company, including most of the company's trust and security staff.
Musk's “free speech absolutism” also meant the company reinstated accounts that had previously been banned. At the same time, the company has rolled back moderation, allowing misinformation and hate speech to spread on the platform.
In April, De Moraes ordered the company to remove a select group of accounts and content that, the court said, spread disinformation about the country's electoral system. (In 2023, after former right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro lost the elections, his supporters stormed the Brazilian legislature.)
