Brazil's ban on X 'problematic' as it involves platforms hosting both legal, illegal speech: Expert

Brazil's ban on Elon Musk-owned social media platformX poses a cautionary message for other democracies trying to balance freedom of expression amidtheir upcoming election process.

Brazil-based experts have highlighted that the ban could become a problem as it hosts both legal and illegal speech.

Last month, Brazil banned X after the country's Supreme Court blocked the social network because Musk refused to comply with the top court's orders to suspend certain accounts. Alexandre de Moraes, a Brazilian Supreme Court justice, ordered the country'stelecom agency to block access to X.

“Even if we look at international standards of freedom of expression, blocking an entire platform is seen as a drastic measure,” said Veridiana Alimonti, a Brazil-based expert with the Electronic Frontier Foundation told Bloomberg. “It’s problematic when it involves platforms that host both legal and illegal speech.”

The judiciary in the countries, including in Brazil, has the power to demand the removal of specific posts and accounts from social media platforms. However, exercising that power comes with its setbacks, especially the danger that a total ban on X will fuel accusations of censorship and further fracture the global internet.

Although governments worldwide are dealing with similar battles against fake news and hateful content on X, Europe and the United Statesare unlikely to do what Brazil did, as per officials, academics, and industry experts, according to a report by Bloomberg.

Watch |Elon Musk's X banned in Brazil after disinformation row

Previously, Musk has complied with demands from other nations, including India, to take down content from the social media platform. For instance, in India, the posts about farmer protests were singled out for removal by the government.

This week, X also agreed to the European Union's demands to stop processing the personal information ofusers in the 27-nation blocto train its artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot Grok.

Mariana Valente, a law professor and the director of Brazil's InternetLab, a think tank, said, "Where this is heading from here will really depend on Elon Musk. I think if Elon Musk decides to start to comply, as he eventually did in India, for example, it might be that X comes back."

She added, "But if Elon Musk doesn’t act differently, I think X or Twitter will be blocked in Brazil for a long time."

Bruna Santos, head of the Wilson Center’s Brazil Institute, said that there should be a discussion about whether Brazil's high court is overstepping its authority, adding that she does believe that Moraes has "gone too far" on various occasions.

She added that however, this cannot be discussed at this moment when questioning Moraes "sounds like you are defending Musk".

(With inputs from agencies)