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"People who use VPN to access X will be subject to daily fines of US$8,900" Edit: Thanks for this user https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41404325 https://ne
by virgulino 2y ago
"People who use VPN to access X will be subject to daily fines of US$8,900"
Edit: Thanks for this user https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41404325 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41404325 for posting the court order and bringing this new information:
Apple and Google must remove all VPN apps from their stores!
Apple and Google must DELETE all VPN apps already installed on users' phones!!!
https://apnews.com/article/brazil-musk-x-suspended-de-moraes-46c9d5c5c895e17d9adfac43e6ac20fd https://apnews.com/article/brazil-musk-x-suspended-de-moraes...
- narrator 2y agoI think he's just making it up as he goes along now.
- facorreia 2y agoIn Brazil, a Justice of the Supreme Court has the power to impose fines on people and companies that violate the law. In this case, federal law #12.965.
- pmdr 2y agoCan individual judges do as they please without any voting or consensus?
- NomDePlum 2y agoThere job is to interpret and implement the law. So they should never do as they please but ensure the law is enforced. Sometimes that's conjunction with a jury or as a panel of judges. Those scenarios involve voting or consensus. But not all judgements are made this way. Decisions can be appealed or challenged by higher courts.
- virgulino 2y agoI did NOT violate the law. How come he is deleting the VPN apps on my phone??? That I need to remote to my overseas job??? How come I I'm now banned from reading what Zelensky, Kasparov, Yann LeCun, and thousands of others world leaders have to say? How come my neighbor, who makes a honest living through X-Twitter, has now lost her job?
- swatcoder 2y ago> How come I I'm now banned from reading what Zelensky, Kasparov, Yann LeCun, and thousands of others world leaders have to say? > How come my neighbor, who makes a honest living through X-Twitter, has now lost her job? Because the other party did violate the law. Unfortunately, Twitter got taken over by an international ideologue who likes to pick fights, and you and your neighbor are suffering the consequences of that. He doesn't care about you in the least, and you should be wary about asking your government to pick up the slack for his egotism as it would just position him to further ignore or exploit you and your community. (The broader VPN ban is admittedly another thing, though.)
- hagbard_c 2y ago> Twitter got taken over by an international ideologue Twitter was bought from ideologues by someone who opened it up to other ideologies. While this may have increased the absolute ideological load on the platform it actually decreased the effective ideological charge since opposite sides cancel out each other, pulling the balance towards the centre where it used to tilt heavily towards a single side.
- pkaeding 2y agoI don't think opposing ideas cancel each other out, like so much electrical charge. The more opposing ideas on a platform, the more ideas are spread, tested, strengthened, weakened, and grown. An echo chamber is where ideas go to die.
- nemo44x 2y agoThese people never seem to learn that when the table turns, and it will, that they won’t like it anymore. They lived when the censor suited them but cry foul when it’s in opposition. It’s important to curate a culture and agreed set of norms that you can live with when you’re not in control.
- guhcampos 2y ago> the effective ideological charge since opposite sides cancel out each other I honestly, wholeheartedly wish that was true. In reality, however, the ideology of whoever holds more economic power has orders of magnitude more weight than the one of the powerless masses.
- cassianoleal 2y agoWhich part of that law have the users of VPNs violated?
- Pedro_Ribeiro 2y agothe part they just made up of course!
- virgulino 2y agoIt sure looks that way! He has just issued a new court order backtracking on the removal of VPN apps from stores. But the fine still stands: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41405776 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41405776
- marcosdumay 2y agoWow! I had to check with local news, because I couldn't believe it. It checks out, he did impose the fine. (It's R$50k if somebody is as uninformed as I was.)
- consumer451 2y agoThat is deeply messed up. Wow, that's nearly $9000 USD.
- marcosdumay 2y agoYep. That is about 2 years of salary at the minimum wage.
- Natsu 2y agoAnd that's per day
- sva_ 2y agoIs it normal that a judge can impose such blanket fines on users?
- Natsu 2y agoThis guy is the head of the STF, the highest court in Brazil, so he's kinda doing an "I am the law" bit here. That said, I do think that judges in Brazil can have a larger investigative role due to the different legal system that does not happen in other countries with more separation of powers to prevent exactly this sort of thing.
- IG_Semmelweiss 2y agoThat's not the case. The law as it applies, is thoroughly explained here. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39966382 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39966382
- Natsu 2y agoTo be clear, I think Moraes is out of control in this case.
- matheusmoreira 2y agoThis is Brazil. That guy is a judge-god-king. Whatever he writes on a piece of paper becomes law. Saddest part is even on HN you will find brazilians supporting everything he does.
- IG_Semmelweiss 2y agoLets be fair now. It was not like this as far as I can tell, before Lava Jato. Its just that the executive and legislative are now so weakened due to corruption scandals (and open investigations) that no one seemingly dares to move against 1 wild judge. I wonder how this ends though. 1 judge seemingly has more power now than a set of democratically elected senators
- baybal2 2y ago[dead]
- cute_boi 2y agoThis is why side loading feature is important. Government shouldn't decide what should I do as per their whims.
- threatofrain 2y agoThat won't stop you from being fined $9k USD!
- IG_Semmelweiss 2y agoI wonder, is there a realistic chance the govt can somewhat easily detect what you have side loaded? ( short of opening your phone and browsing instslled apps )
- akvadrako 2y agoNot remotely without a cooperating app or app store. But they could detect VPN traffic for most VPNs and tie that to your sim card which is tied to your ID.
- guhcampos 2y agoThe text is weird. It kind of looks like they meant to write something else entirely. The order does say Apple and Google must take down the VPN apps, but the way it's been written makes me think it was intended to order VPN apps to make Twitter/X unavailable, but someone misunderstood it or poorly expressed it. Of course you can't expect judges to understand technical terms very well, but this guy has been dealing with tech long enough I feel like they should know this VPN text is bullshit.
- kgeist 2y agoPretty hardcore even by the Russian standards. People aren't fined for using VPN here. That's some next level.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- jauntywundrkind 2y agoLet's see what happens when Google refuses to comply! Not gonna happen. But it should, if this is the order!
- ffsm8 2y agoWhy do you want Google of all companies to stand above the sovereign state, which is a representative democracy? The ruling is incredibly dumb for sure (at least the removing apps from devices part), but if the sovereign state demands it, they'll either have to exit the market/nation entirely or comply.
- g-b-r 2y agobeing a democracy does not guarantee that everything you do is correct
- ffsm8 2y agoOf course it doesn't guarantee that, nor did I ever imply such. It's still the sovereign state however, businesses that want to be active on their territory have to comply with local legislation, wherever that legislation is an extreme overreach or not. This is not a case of one arm of the government doing whatever it wants like with PRISM. This is a public ruling. they're criminal if they don't comply, by definition.
- leereeves 2y agoHarriet Tubman was a criminal too. Sometimes being a criminal by defying an unjust law is the best thing you can do.
- itsdrewmiller 2y agoWow. The VPN piece of this ought to be the nut graf. Wild overreach.
- bufferoverflow 2y agoAnd banning a social media platform that millions use is not?
- itsdrewmiller 2y agoX has refused to abide by the governments decisions, so that is big but understandable news. Trying to casually ban all VPNs as part of that is surprising and excessive.
- crazygringo 2y agoBanning a site is one thing. Banning an entire communications technology, with abusively high fines for citizens who defy the ban, is on a whole other level.
- cassianoleal 2y agoX is not communications technology. It's a forum website controlled by a private company. It's not like they're a protocol or that they're infrastructure.
- crazygringo 2y agoX is the site I was referring to. Virtual Private Networking is the communications technology I was talking about. Banning VPN's is what's shocking here.
- cassianoleal 2y agoOk I misunderstood you. We’re in agreement then!
- matheusmoreira 2y agoI expected the fine but he actually ordered remote removal of VPN apps from user devices? That's pretty fucked up if true. Wow
- dannyphantom 2y agoI uploaded the ruling to the Internet Archive along with a copy of the document pushed through Google Translate https://archive.org/details/Brazil-Court-Suspends-X/ https://archive.org/details/Brazil-Court-Suspends-X/
- hintymad 2y agoWow! Day by day, I appreciate more and more how precious the liberty and freedom we have in the US. And shame on Canada and UK!
- joaogui1 2y agoWhat did Canada and UK do?
- librasteve 2y agogun control
- cormorant 2y agoCriminalize acts that would clearly be free speech in the US: the trucker convoy (Canada) (even just voicing support for it); mean tweets as hate speech (UK) (recent riots, see also JK Rowling).
- virgulino 2y agoTHIS JUST IN: Judge Moraes has backtracked on the removal of VPN apps from stores and phones. He has just issued a new court order. But the ban and the fine of US$8,900 for users who use a VPN to access X-Twitter still apply!
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]