Elon Musk-controlled satellite internet provider Starlink has told Brazil’s telecom regulator Anatel it will not comply with a court order to block social media platform X in the country until its local accounts are unfrozen.
Anatel confirmed the information to Reuters on Monday after its head Carlos Baigorri told Globo TV it had received a note from Starlink, which has more than 200,000 customers in Brazil, and passed it onto Brazil’s top court.
Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes last week ordered all telecom providers in the country to shut down X, which is also owned by billionaire Musk, for lacking a legal representative in Brazil.
The move also led to the freezing of Starlink’s bank accounts in Brazil. Starlink is a unit of Musk-led rocket company SpaceX. The billionaire responded to the account block by calling Moraes a “dictator.”
Twitter did have an office in Brazil (with legal representation) but after refusing to implement court ordered bans, the court fined them. Elon Musk threw a temper tantrum and shut down the Brazil office and eliminated his legal representation in Brazil.
Note that Musk will implement bans when requested by authoritarians, just for some reason he draws the line when it’s a court order in a democratic country.
Anyway the situation where Twitter doesn’t have legal representation is a situation Elon Musk created. Basically “I fired my lawyers so there’s nothing you can do against me now! Checkmate!” So Brazil says “fine, I guess we’re banning Twitter then…”
So Space Karen thinks the the law doesn’t apply to him and it’s going to cost him a lot of money. Again.