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Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

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Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#21
Never realized that the political scene in Brazil was as crazy as the article portrays. Makes the US election campaigns look downright tame. As bizarre as some candidates' ideas seem to be, hard to imagine how judges or US congress would get away with attempting the same things.

If provisions like those in the article persist, predictably the predominantly young users of social media will protest loudly, I would think the resulting unrest would be too big a liability for the judges and politicians.

A while back I knew a guy who worked for a US company involved with setting up inventory and telecommunications software for businesses. Having traveled to Brazil to assist with installing the systems, he described the extremely convoluted regulatory environment down there, and how difficult that made it to get anything done.

While the whole affair is hard to understand, the basis for picking on particular targets (e.g., WhatsApp) doesn't make sense. Unless all such services are banned it only punishes the particular providers for no good cause. Speculating out loud about their target selection is unproductive, but possibly someone has more actual info about it.

So I guess like politics anywhere, what they do know well is how to shoot themselves in the foot. Until it's realized what they've done it will cause a lot of trouble for legitimate enterprises, let alone the massive population so negatively affected.

Edit: In the time it took me to write this comment, a bunch of people have add comments about the situation. Wow, that was fast...

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#23
post #7

This is insane, this judge must be on a power trip. WhatsApp is now part of Brazilian social life and economy. Everyone here is part of many groups of friends, family or workmates, that is where most instant communication happens. In my company, our deployment engineers, who usually are on very remote places with bad and unreliable internet, rely on WhatsApp. I'm not saying this is the best practice, but this is simp…

It also says that, in a contained but nontrivial aspect of life, Brazil has given up its sovereignty to WhatsApp (and by transitive ownership, Facebook, and by transitive law enforcement, USA/NSA). And for various reasons, it is applying for a similar serf status at Telegram as we speak.

Think about it: Mark Zuckerberg can task his employees with an elaborate "find and replace" on all brazillian texts, replacing e.g. "sugar" with "salt", and it will just happen. Think that's improbable? Facebook has been toying with your emotions before [0]

[0] http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/jul/02/facebook-a...

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#24
post #14

I am from Brazil, and although bizarre decisions happened before, I can say that this time they actually went through with it, and I can't talk to my psychologist (I only communicate with her with WhatsApp, I never considered that the government would ever actually shut it down). As for the article it is one of the most bizarrely biased articles I ever read, spouting some information that are outright lies. Example:…

>only communicate with her with WhatsApp, I never considered that the government would ever actually shut it down So you got her number on your cellphone which means you can call and text. You can talk to her, not for free but a few messages should be enough to arrange for another free service.

Yep, I am installing Telegram now.

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#25
post #8

It wasn't Congress that decided that. It is a single judge that gave an order to block the service for 48 hours. It can be reversed if another judge decides the "liminar" (I don't know how to say this in English, it's a temporary decision) shouldn't been given.

"Injunction", perhaps?

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#27
post #8

It wasn't Congress that decided that. It is a single judge that gave an order to block the service for 48 hours. It can be reversed if another judge decides the "liminar" (I don't know how to say this in English, it's a temporary decision) shouldn't been given.

"Injunction", perhaps?

That is a good equivalent and it gives some idea of what happened for those familiar with the concept. Thanks for the clarification.

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#28

The news is misrepresenting what is actually happening. A judge ruled for a 48 hour ban of WhatsApp from telcos to try to coerce WhatsApp into releasing private chat information for an ongoing criminal investigation (wild guess: they want information from politically exposed actors due to the recent corruption investigations). There are precedents, and that's a tactic local judges are using to try to get cooperation…

It seems it's related to a narcotraffic investigation, unrelated to corruption scandals, at least for now.

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#29
post #18
post #7

This is insane, this judge must be on a power trip. WhatsApp is now part of Brazilian social life and economy. Everyone here is part of many groups of friends, family or workmates, that is where most instant communication happens. In my company, our deployment engineers, who usually are on very remote places with bad and unreliable internet, rely on WhatsApp. I'm not saying this is the best practice, but this is simp…

Seems to me like it might be WhatsApp that's on a power trip. What would an American judge do if WhatsApp were to ignore a lawful subpoena?

> What would an American judge do if WhatsApp were to ignore a lawful subpoena?

Fine WhatsApp. Not compel all telcos to block it...

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#30

The news is misrepresenting what is actually happening. A judge ruled for a 48 hour ban of WhatsApp from telcos to try to coerce WhatsApp into releasing private chat information for an ongoing criminal investigation (wild guess: they want information from politically exposed actors due to the recent corruption investigations). There are precedents, and that's a tactic local judges are using to try to get cooperation…

My wife is a judge and she is not alarmed. She is terrified. We are green card holders and came back to the country 16 years ago. Tonight was the first time we had a conversation about leaving this place for good.
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