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WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

theintercept.com

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Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#181

Post by jgreen10 »

soneca wrote: post #64

I'm here to defend the judge's ruling, a position very unpopular among all my friends here in Brazil. Brazilian law regarding regarding privacy of users of internet services is very recent and clear: if a judge order the company to share a specific user data, the company must comply. You can disagree with the law, but the law is there. Now, the judge ordered Whatsapp to share a particular user conversation (a suspect…

Hey soneca, could you give me a transcript of the conversation between Dilma Rousseff and Lula da Silva on January 31st, 2011? If you can't, then you'll have to go to prison.

It's an irrational, unreasonable request, which makes it highly questionable as a legal ruling.

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#182

Post by philovivero »

soapdog wrote: post #134
aerovistae wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your analogy between the terms 1st/3rd world country and that particular racial epithet is beyond absurd. To confirm this just try saying one or the other at work to test the reactions you get.

I am saying this because people do take offense on the 3rd world monicker. In many fields that term is considered offensive when used in public discourse. This is not a joke. What a group perceives as normal speech may be a term that in other circles is considered bad and better terms and classifications might be in place

I think only citizens of third-world countries are offended by the third-world monicker.

It is englightening to note that a false insult is usually shrugged off, and a true insult usually taken to heart.

The trick is to notice when the insult is true and modify your behaviour so that the insult is no longer applicable.

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#183

Post by MajesticHobo »

sangnoir wrote: post #159
wslh wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was not talking about Facebook but about Brazilians. Also, following your reasoning, if Facebook was a participant in PRISM, does it mean they don't have any right to fight? Privacy is at stake here, Facebook is only one problem instance.

> Privacy is at stake here Are you arguing against the use of warrants in police investigations?

WhatsApp is the most popular end-to-end encrypted chat app in the world. Shutting it down for 100 million people not suspected or charged with any crime is an incredibly disproportionate, privacy-thwarting response to not being able to access user data in one criminal investigation.

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#184

Post by adrenalinelol »

soneca wrote: post #143
btreesOfSpring wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This ruling makes end-to-end encryption illegal where, a service provider at no time holds the keys to decrypt messages between communicating parties. This is a protocol decision and since the Snowden revelations, a point of concern for civil libertarians. The Apple v FBI debate is a child of these exact concerns. The idea that governments want to legislate unfettered access to private communications and devices shou…

I agree with you. And I think all this should be framed "is the law right? should we change it?"; instead is always presented as "an authoritarian, out of his league, small town judge who is arrogant and clueless about tech". He is just following the law, so fight the law, no diminish the judge. Remembering that a "single judge" following the law with authonomy launched the biggest attack on corruption of brazilian h…

The ruling punishes Brazilians on order(s) of magnitude more than it'll Facebook(WhatsApp). This heavy-handed approach is a power grab.

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#185

Post by TearsInTheRain »

CiPHPerCoder wrote: post #130
ww520 wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the problem with all these judicial orders. They think it's a flip of the switch to comply. Why don't the courts provide the money to build the services and infrastructure to comply with the order?

That would require a backdoor that didn't exist at the time and that WhatsApp doesn't want to create.

It would require more than a backdoor but dozens of data centers as well as the software and personnel to manage them all

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#186

Post by wslh »

sangnoir wrote: post #159
wslh wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was not talking about Facebook but about Brazilians. Also, following your reasoning, if Facebook was a participant in PRISM, does it mean they don't have any right to fight? Privacy is at stake here, Facebook is only one problem instance.

> Privacy is at stake here Are you arguing against the use of warrants in police investigations?

I am against the use of warrants when there is nothing to search...

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#187

Post by cm3 »

This is exactly why operating many small Murmur and/or XMPP servers is a better approach than relying on a single big-co's proprietary service with which you no signed SLA. Just like game servers, it's easy to operate a community Murmur server and it's also possible to set up one on your home router given the low bandwidth and hardwre requirements.

Yet, if I suggest that I prefer Mumble over closed source voice chat or centrally provided WebRTC service like appear.in, people downvote me or treat me a like a luddite.

But I do understand that given the comfort of a centrally managed WhatsApp, it's hard to resist.

The only reason there are no fancy mobile clients is that those who would build them are doing it for the silo'd Vibers, Skypes, and WhatsApps.

Comfort seems to trump reliability.

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#188

Post by dmix »

sangnoir wrote: post #153
latj wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are missing the most important part of the story. Facebook and Whatsapp are not ignoring the request. They have said that it is impossible for them to provide the information requested.

> They have said that it is impossible for them to provide the information requested. They have said this to the press or to the court? Because it seems to me like Fb/Whatsapp have been pointedly ignoring the courts for months. The least they could do is fly down a lackey to Brazil and say it in person and/or alternatively hire a Brazilian law firm to represent them.

Brazil already arrested a Facebook executive and detained them for 24hrs this year over the fact they said there is nothing that can do regarding the information request.

I'm not sure what you're proposing Facebook to do here? Hand over useless encrypted data? Hold a cryptography seminar for Brazillian law enforcement to explain what end-to-end encryption means? Have more of their employees risk arrest?

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#189

Post by ralmeida »

raverbashing wrote: post #49
notliketherest wrote: post #4

What most people outside of Brazil don't realize is that WhatsApp is almost universally used by Brazillians to communicate about EVERYTHING, even your doctor [0][1]. My wife is Brazillian and uses it to communicate with her family in Brazil every day. This will have disastrous consequences for Brazilians domestically and internationally. This policy is being put in place by unelected judges and cartel of monopolistic…

No, it won't have disastrous consequences. It happened last year as well Typical authoritarian act by a lower court judge that will be reversed in 1 or 2 days Nothing to see here

Depends on how you define disastrous. As pointed out several other times in the comments, several commercial activities rely on WhatsApp on several levels.

Even blocking for a few hours causes several man-hours to be spent in setting up alternatives. And lots of telephone costs, as well, since many companies - including those with technicians on the field, sometimes in another state - use that to communicate instead.

Re: WhatsApp, Used by 100M Brazilians, Shut Down Nationwide Today by a Single Judge

#190

Post by lucaspottersky »

soneca wrote: post #64

I'm here to defend the judge's ruling, a position very unpopular among all my friends here in Brazil. Brazilian law regarding regarding privacy of users of internet services is very recent and clear: if a judge order the company to share a specific user data, the company must comply. You can disagree with the law, but the law is there. Now, the judge ordered Whatsapp to share a particular user conversation (a suspect…

while (true) { printf("There are unjust laws. The law can't be above the people. Laws are not a moral absolute."); }
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