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WhatsApp is back online in Brazil

209 points| natthub | 10 years ago |facebook.com | reply

166 comments

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[+] lucb1e|10 years ago|reply
> the idea that everyone in Brazil can be denied the freedom to communicate the way they want is very scary in a democracy

Says the person (in name of the company, I assume) whose company blocks things they don't "like", such as messages containing telegram.org or telegram.me[1].

Now Facebook is not a democracy and they can block and censor pretty much any message they like, but now they go on to tell Brazil how it should run its judicial system. That's like giving people free beer and then asking them to take up pitchforks and come along to put some pressure on a third party you don't like very much.

[1] https://i.snag.gy/9KBPGR.jpg

[+] hoorayimhelping|10 years ago|reply
There is a huge difference between "the government of Brazil denying everyone the freedom to communicate the way they want" and "facebook not auto-linking to a competitor's site in a chat program." You're comparing a government making communication through a specific (and popular) channel illegal, and a company not providing a link to a website as they send your message to your recipient.

I know Hacker News enjoys getting riled up at Facebook, but come on. You're not comparing apples to apples, you're not even comparing food to food, it's like saying this rock isn't like this sandwich.

[+] twoarray|10 years ago|reply
Mark Zuckerberg "urged" Brazilians to tell Congress to "ban bans of online services" in the name of democracy.

Am I an irrational nationalist for believing he shouldn't get into the politics of any country (especially outside of the US)?

Last time someone tried to help us (Brazilians), we got a military dictatorship.

[+] guiporto|10 years ago|reply
> Facebook is not a democracy and they can block and censor pretty much any message they like, but now they go on to tell Brazil how it should run its judicial system

Yeah, Facebook is a company - not a country. You can't compare apples to oranges.

Facebook can do whatever it want and people are free to chose to use it service or not. Brazilians had no choice on this case.

[+] make3|10 years ago|reply
That's fucking dodgy/unacceptable. I know they did this for another site that gave money to people for spamming their connections with links to their website, which I guess is borderline acceptable. In the case of telegram though, there is no redeeming circumstance of any kind, they're just censoring for a business advantage [without it being directly visible to the user, which is even worse], and that's just really unacceptable for me
[+] x0054|10 years ago|reply
Am I missing something? Just tried it on my phone and it works fine in on my end, is this something that just doesn't get converted to a link on the other side? Not converting something to a link is a far cry from outright censorship, still pretty shady in a mostly meaningless way, though.
[+] mirimir|10 years ago|reply
But wait, if WhatsApp is end-to-end encrypted, that failure to URL convert must be a local operation. And if it's a local operation, maybe there's a workaround. But maybe apps are locked down too tightly. In any case, going from telegram.org as text to https://telegram.org/ is not exactly rocket science, no?
[+] the_ancient|10 years ago|reply
Last i checked Facebook does not have the authority to arrest, kill, put people in cages.. these are all things a governments do to citizen their violate their laws.

So no facebook censoring telegram is aboslutely nothing like a government doing anything.

It is extremely ignorant to ever compare a companies action to a government actions. A person can stop using (or never start like me) facebook, a person can not quit their government, or refuse their government ...

[+] nxzero|10 years ago|reply
Maybe this is obvious, or that I'm wrong, but the issue in Brazil is that most Brazilians are left-wing conservatives AND within in recent past put the current government in power. Long term this is the issue, not these "cyber attacks" - which are to me very problematic, but only a symptom of the issue.
[+] lucastx|10 years ago|reply
We dodged this bullet but here in Brazil but RIGHT NOW there is a much more dangerous risk: with the Parliamentary Commission on Cybercrimes (CPI dos Crimes Cibernéticos / CPICIBER) report a "combo" of bills will get "fast track" on Congress and, to list some things, expand data retention, allow access to IP addresses without warrant and allow judges to block "illegal" content, including copyright violations much like DMCA does (they use the "notice-and-staydown" terminology).

More details here:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/04/battery-dangerous-cybe...

https://www.accessnow.org/access-now-delivers-petition-brazi...

https://theintercept.com/2016/04/26/brazilian-cybercrime-bil...

The final voting will happen TOMORROW, 9 a.m. Brasilia time (GMT-3), 5am in California I guess. If you can help raise awareness and use EFF's Action Center to message the parliamentaries through Twitter and Facebook around that time, it would help a lot.

https://act.eff.org/action/fight-back-against-brazil-s-draco...

In portuguese, this is the best starting point on the debate (disclaimer: I work on antivigilancia.org):

https://antivigilancia.org/pt/cpiciber/

[+] marcosdumay|10 years ago|reply
Your page isn't clear, what exactly happens tomorrow? Is it the final voting on the CPI? Or is there some law project under vote right now?
[+] guhcampos|10 years ago|reply
This is hardly the first or the last time this kind of things happens in Brazil.

Long story short, this is exactly the same standoff that happened recently in the US between the FBI and Apple: the authorities want information from a suspect phone, and assume they can get it from a company, in this case WhatsApp. A warrant is issued, and the company refuses to comply.

The big difference is: WhatsApp has been a major headache for telecom companies in Brazil, especially since the arrival of voice calls. With Wifi everywhere, people have been avoiding expensive traditional calls and just using WhatsApp to call for free.

For that reason, the telcos in Brazil are more than happy to comply with court when it comes to WhatsApp blocks, so they do it right away, no questions asked.

[+] melvinmt|10 years ago|reply
Sounds similar to the position that Skype was in a decade ago. Telcos in Europe hated Skype and tried everything to block it or making it slow (deep packet inspection) but when the iPhone came out they couldn't stop the mobile web revolution.
[+] deleted_soon|10 years ago|reply
The thing is, WhatsApp is not just refusing to comply - they can't comply, since they don't retain message data. In addition, now that all messages are encrypted end to end, it will be impossible for them to comply in the future.
[+] chatmasta|10 years ago|reply
> the idea that everyone in Brazil can be denied the freedom to communicate the way they want is very scary in a democracy

If companies like Facebook were not funneling everybody onto centralized platforms, it would be harder for an ISP to deny that freedom.

The centralization of communication platforms is a bigger problem than any ISP censorship. That they have a target to shutdown at all is the real issue.

[+] davesque|10 years ago|reply
Agreed. Zuckerberg's little victory speech in this post reminds me of the kind of talk he used in defending his free basics plan. I get a little tired of people with heavy business interests weighing in on "democracy" and "freedom."
[+] tomash|10 years ago|reply
Facebook once banned me for 24h just for sending my friend a link (via messenger) to animgif containing female boobs. (together with ban FB expired all API access tokens of my apps) Zuckerberg positioning himself as champion of democracy and unrestricted communication is ridiculous.
[+] antisthenes|10 years ago|reply
Out of curiosity, what did Brazil use before WhatsApp existed?

It seems strange to me that 1 app can capture such an overwhelming majority, because it's just a client, of which there have always been dozens if not hundreds.

[+] notliketherest|10 years ago|reply
This follows a nation wide uproar. Definitely not a popular decision in a country that relies on this service, however the decision was made. My wife is Brazilian and you should see her Facebook news feed...they're blaming the same government they want to throw out of office - not a great timing on their part.
[+] icebraining|10 years ago|reply
On whose part? This wasn't a decision by the government.
[+] hudell|10 years ago|reply
"Brazilians have been leaders in connecting the world and creating an open internet for many years. I hope you make your voice heard now and demand change"

I think he didn't word this right.

[+] smegel|10 years ago|reply
What does the USA do about WhatsApp? Do they really tolerate end to end encryption they cant subpoena the company for...or does the NSA have a big fat pipe into the WhatsApp data-center?
[+] camillomiller|10 years ago|reply
Once again the bigger problem we really have to face is the corporatization of the defense of civil rights
[+] educar|10 years ago|reply
I hope the govt sees the reliance on this service and does something positive about it (for example, build their own or tie up with some company). Such massive dependence on a company with no contracts is going to end up in a mess later.
[+] ptaipale|10 years ago|reply
I do not understand this approach. A market solution works and is popular, so the government should step in and try to develop something better with "contracts"?
[+] visarga|10 years ago|reply
On the other hand, using a government issued instant messenger seems even more dangerous. I think Brazilians have more to fear from their own government than foreign governments.
[+] source99|10 years ago|reply
And now Facebook is down for me entirely.
[+] walrus01|10 years ago|reply
gggggggooooooaaaaaaallllllllllllllllllllllll
[+] smaili|10 years ago|reply
I'm fairly certain Brazil didn't just wake up one day and decide to reactivate WhatsApp's service...

So my first reaction to this news is what did Facebook/WhatsApp/Zuckerberg do, or possibly even give up, in order to change Brazil's mind.

[+] x0054|10 years ago|reply
Nothing, their judicial system functioned as it should, only a day too slow. A district judge in the middle of the country has no right to do stuff like that, and the appellate judge fixed the overstep. Now, step 2, disbar the original district judge.
[+] readams|10 years ago|reply
There is only one specific judge that has ordered the block both times it has occurred. Both times it has been overturned when appealed to other judges in Brazil. It's not "Brazil" that made this decision. It's one extremist judge.