Brazil blocks Starlink bank accounts to put pressure on X

X has been given 24 hours to name a new legal representative or face a nationwide suspension, while Starlink bank accounts have been frozen.

Tensions between Elon Musk’s X and Brazil’s legal system are heating up and Starlink has gotten caught in the crossfire.

After months of legal arguments between X and Brazil’s Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes about misinformation on the platform, X says it expects to be shut down in the country soon.

X closed its Brazil office earlier this month and said Moraes threatened one of its legal representatives with arrest if the company did not agree to remove some content from its platform. The company is also in a dispute over fines it was ordered to pay due to its failure to turn over some documents.

Under Brazilian law, social networks must have a representative to receive and consider government takedown notices about political misinformation. X has no such person after closing down its Brazil office. Moraes gave the X platform 24 hours to name a new legal representative or face a nationwide suspension.

Earlier this year, the judge ordered X to block certain accounts amid a crackdown on so-called “digital militias” that were accused of spreading fake news during former president Jair Bolsonaro’s reign. X has described these requests as illegal and claims Moraes is attempting to “censor his political opponents”.

“We are absolutely not insisting that other countries have the same free speech laws as the United States,” X said on its platform. “The fundamental issue at stake here is that Judge de Moraes demands we break Brazil’s own laws. We simply won’t do that.

“In the days to come, we will publish all of Judge de Moraes’ illegal demands and all related court filings in the interest of transparency.”

Meanwhile, the bank accounts of Musk’s Starlink service have been frozen in Brazil following an order by the country’s Supreme Court.

Starlink said this order prevents the company – a SpaceX subsidiary – from conducting financial transactions in Brazil. It also said that the order is based on “an unfounded determination that Starlink should be responsible for the fines levied – unconstitutionally – against X”.

Musk also spoke against the decision and said SpaceX and X are “two completely different companies with different shareholders”. In various posts, Musk has called Moraes a “dictator” and a “criminal”.

“Many remote schools and hospitals depend on SpaceX’s Starlink,” Musk said. “SpaceX will provide internet service to users in Brazil for free until this matter is resolved, as we cannot receive payment, but don’t want to cut anyone off.”

X also said that it will not comply in secret with illegal orders, “unlike other social media and technology platforms”. But reports last year claimed the platform had at least partially complied with almost all takedown requests from governments since Musk took over the platform, with roughly half of those requests stemming from Turkey, AlJazeera reports.

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Elon Musk in 2023. Image: Kirsty O’Connor/No 10 Downing Street via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)