Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours • Hacker News Board

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#71

Post by msh » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:09 AM UTC

bjt wrote: post #61

msh wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But its not a lawful subpoena. What's app is a America n company, so it should only respond to American supoenas. Just as a American judge should not be able to order a Brazilian company to do anything before having it go though the Brazilian courts.

A Brazilian company with a presence in the US could absolutely be subject to a US court order without any court in Brazil needing to be involved. You don't get to dodge the laws of a country you're operating in just because your HQ is in some other country.

But whatsapp don't have a business presence in Brazil.

Just because they have users there is not the same as a business presence.

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#72

Post by sounds » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:17 AM UTC

eduardordm wrote: post #30

hcarvalhoalves wrote: post #5

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.

Dictator-like behavior has a polarizing effect, which is generally the precursor to large realignments (and possibly violence). On that note: please be careful!

"The more you tighten your grip, the more star systems will slip through your fingers." - Stars Wars Episode 4

Large realignments are the fallout: those who benefit from the dictatorship will be in favor of it. Dictators also have difficulty maintaining their grip on power.

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#73

Post by Tomte » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:21 AM UTC

aianus wrote: post #66

Tomte wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Overseas" in that context would be the US, right? :-) We have exactly that problem with Facebook and other big US companies in Europe (Uber comes to mind): they act in Europe (and do damage here), but hide in the US. Oftentimes not even replying to court orders, because hey, what can a lowly regional court judge from Germany do, right? If you want to play here, comply with our laws. If you don't, then don't be surpr…

Why should a lowly regional judge in Germany (or the US for that matter) be allowed to meddle with a national or global communications network? There must be millions of judges in the world, many of whom are corrupt, power-hungry, or just plain stupid. It would be silly for Facebook, Google, etc. to blindly obey each one of their ramblings. Edit: s/shut down/meddle with/

We make sure our justice system is not corrupt. You don't get to ignore our laws, just because you conveniently hint to corruption.

If you feel our country is too corrupt to make business in, great, stay away.

Why should we allow extra-legal, non-elected company managers from abroad to trump our constitutional, legal and parliamentary-approved laws?

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#74

Post by DannyBee » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:23 AM UTC

cthalupa wrote: post #45

rmdoss wrote: post #19

Can confirm whatsapp is down for some friends in Brazil. However, the real reason is not for what Techcrunch is saying. The issue is that WhatsApp didn't want to cooperate with the federal police and release chat information from some criminals. According to some sources there, they followed all due process and WhatsApp ignored. As a retaliation, to show that WhatsApp has to comply with Brazilian local laws when stor…

>As a retaliation, to show that WhatsApp has to comply with Brazilian local laws when storing data from Brazilians using the service in Brazil, they banned WhatsApp for 48 hrs. Why must WhatsApp comply with Brazilian laws? They have no offices there. If I run, say, a porn site, hosted in the US, as a US company, is it my responsibility to prevent users in a country where pornography is illegal from using my site? Do…

"Why must WhatsApp comply with Brazilian laws? They have no offices there. " They don't.

They only have to comply if they don't want to be blocked.

"If I run, say, a porn site, hosted in the US, as a US company, is it my responsibility to prevent users in a country where pornography is illegal from using my site? Do I have any duty to comply with said country requesting the identity and viewing history of citizens living in it? "

Generally not, as long as you are not going to travel to that country and subject yourself to personal jurisdiction ;-)

"Of course not. That country can certainly block my site if their laws allow them to, but the idea that whatsapp /has/ to comply is ridiculous. "

Errr, they have to comply or be blocked from brazil's perspective, and that's what the poster said. It doesn't sound like you disagree with that, so i'm not clear on what you are arguing for ...

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#75

Post by Splines » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:30 AM UTC

jmcphers wrote: post #52

NN88 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

is it that much better?

Yes. Signal has perfect forward secrecy. There's no way any government could compel them to release private chat information: they are literally unable to do so.

Even so, a government could still block them until they realized it's futile (or something). The end effect is in their favor: users to move to other platforms that are not as secure.

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#76

Post by oceanofsolaris » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:36 AM UTC

reubenmorais wrote: post #3

Telegram reports 1.000.000 new users 4 hours after the block started, 1.500.000 new users 1 hour ago: https://twitter.com/telegram

I think in this context it might be interesting that WhatsApp is actually using the same end-to-end encryption employed by Signal/Textsecure for some users. This encryption is in general considered superior to the strange protocol Telegram employs.

The problem WhatsApp has right now in Brazil MIGHT be caused by them simply not posessing the information the judge wants them to hand out. But I am heavily speculating here, since I neither know what information they were asked for, nor whether the data in question was end-to-end encrypted.

The problem with WhatsApps encryption is of course that you have no way to check the encryption status of a conversation. It seems to only work for one-to-one messages between Android users as of the end of last year. Maybe this has changed in the meantime. Maybe the encryption has been enabled for more or less users in the meantime. Who knows.

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#77

Post by aianus » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:36 AM UTC

Tomte wrote: post #73

aianus wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should a lowly regional judge in Germany (or the US for that matter) be allowed to meddle with a national or global communications network? There must be millions of judges in the world, many of whom are corrupt, power-hungry, or just plain stupid. It would be silly for Facebook, Google, etc. to blindly obey each one of their ramblings. Edit: s/shut down/meddle with/

We make sure our justice system is not corrupt. You don't get to ignore our laws, just because you conveniently hint to corruption. If you feel our country is too corrupt to make business in, great, stay away. Why should we allow extra-legal, non-elected company managers from abroad to trump our constitutional, legal and parliamentary-approved laws?

I'm sure you believe your country's laws are fair, just, constitutional, and parliamentary-approved. However, so do Thai people believe about their laws against insulting their King. Do you think Facebook should be in the business of censoring posts insulting the Thai King just because some judge there gives them a court order?

I maintain that Facebook should, in general, ignore foreign court orders and just do what's right. At the risk, of course, of being blocked entirely in that country.

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#78

Post by oceanofsolaris » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:39 AM UTC

jmcphers wrote: post #52

NN88 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

is it that much better?

Yes. Signal has perfect forward secrecy. There's no way any government could compel them to release private chat information: they are literally unable to do so.

WhatsApp does/might (who knows, they are not transparent about it and it is closed source) employ the same end-to-end encrypted protocol as Signal does (for some users):

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/nov/19/whatsapp-m...

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#79

Post by dhackner » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:42 AM UTC

benevol wrote: post #68

jzwinck wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no such thing as a Brazilian green card. Green card is a figure of speech that is mostly used to refer to US permanent residency. Other countries often just call it PR.

> Other countries often just call it PR. Very urgently needed PR, if one considers the pace at which the country is turning into an Orwellian total surveillance state (most recent data point: CISA bill hidden in the federal budget bill).

PR = shorthand for Permanent Resident

Re: Brazilian Judge Shuts Down WhatsApp for 48 Hours

#80

Post by Tomte » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 6:51 AM UTC

aianus wrote: post #77

Tomte wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We make sure our justice system is not corrupt. You don't get to ignore our laws, just because you conveniently hint to corruption. If you feel our country is too corrupt to make business in, great, stay away. Why should we allow extra-legal, non-elected company managers from abroad to trump our constitutional, legal and parliamentary-approved laws?

I'm sure you believe your country's laws are fair, just, constitutional, and parliamentary-approved. However, so do Thai people believe about their laws against insulting their King. Do you think Facebook should be in the business of censoring posts insulting the Thai King just because some judge there gives them a court order? I maintain that Facebook should, in general, ignore foreign court orders and just do what'…

If they want to do business there, sure. The alternative stands: get out of the country.

You maintain that Facebook should, in general, follow your legal system.

Do you believe that America and only America is "fair, just, constitutional, and parliamentary-approved"?

That's basically American exceptionalism at its best.