SAO PAULO — Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes on Friday added conditions for Elon Musk’s X to have its service reestablished in the country, one day after the social media platform said it had complied with all the judge’s demands, including naming a legal representative.
De Moraes said in a ruling that X may only be reinstated in Brazil after another company linked to the billionaire, satellite-based internet service provider Starlink, withdraws its appeals related to the case. X has been blocked in Brazil for nearly a month. De Moraes ordered the shutdown after sparring with Musk for months over free speech , far-right accounts and misinformation.
Earlier this month, de Moraes ordered Starlink’s assets be used to cover X’s fines that already exceeded $3 million. The Brazilian justice argued the two companies are part of the same economic group — a justification that has been questioned by some legal experts.
His new ruling also established a fine of 10 million Brazilian reais ($1.84 million). Experts examining X’s IP addresses — numeric designations that identifies sites’ location on the internet — said the company temporarily routed users through the servers of Cloudflare, a content delivery network.
X said it changed its servers to service clients in Latin America, which inadvertently brought the social media network back online in Brazil.
One source familiar with the judge’s decision told The Associated Press that both of de Moraes’ conditions are new. The source spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak publicly.
De Moraes also accepted X’s newly designated legal representative, but fined her in 300,000 reais ($55,000) for not complying with other decisions he made in August. The company’s lack of a legal representative in the country was the trigger for his decision to suspend the social media channel on Aug. 30.
The company has clashed with de Moraes since earlier this year over free speech, accounts associated with the far-right and misinformation on the platform, and it claims to be a victim of censorship.
Musk and his supporters have called de Moraes an authoritarian and a censor for his rulings, but those have been repeatedly upheld by his peers — including X’s nationwide suspension. On Aug. 28, X said it was removing all remaining Brazil staff in the country “effective immediately,” saying de Moraes had threatened its legal representative in the country with arrest.
The company has reversed course in recent days. On Thursday, X submitted documentation to de Moraes saying it had complied with all his decisions and requesting its reactivation in Brazil, according to sources familiar with the decision, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly.
X was blocked in the highly online country of 213 million people, where it was one of X’s biggest markets, with more than 20 million users. Brazil has more restrictive rules on speech than the US.
X said in a statement on Thursday it is “committed to protecting free speech within the boundaries of the law and we recognize and respect the sovereignty of the countries in which we operate.”
“We believe that the people of Brazil having access to X is essential for a thriving democracy, and we will continue to defend freedom of expression and due process of law through legal processes,” it said in a post on its Global Government Affairs account.
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AP writer David Biller reported from Rio de Janeiro