Most of Brazil’s internet users also use WhatsApp because of the high prices of traditional texting and mobile phone plans in general.
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Zuckerberg said that he was “stunned that our efforts to protect people’s data would result in such an extreme decision by a single judge to punish every person in Brazil who uses WhatsApp”. While the shutdown lasted only half a day, WhatsApp competitor Telegram sent out a tweet stating that it was downloaded on 1 million devices in Brazil yesterday.
Social media companies such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter have huge amounts of users in Brazil.
Individually in the court case, Brazilian phone companies have encouraged the authorities to control the usage of complimentary voice over-internet services.
A lower court ruling ordered telecoms companies to block the messaging app, which has around 100 million users in Brazil.
The original ban was made by a judge in Sao Bernardo do Campo, Sao Paulo after the company failed to obey with two judicial rulings to share information in a criminal case.
The unprecedented 48-hour blockage was to implement a Sao Paulo state court order and was to take effect at 0200 GMT on Thursday, although it was not immediately clear if service providers would acquiesce to the order.
But Brazilian media said WhatsApp was requested to supply information on communicating by way of a suspected gang member who’s alleged to have used prohibited action to be organised by WhatsApp.
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In a nutshell, government officials feel out of the loop and believe tech companies like Facebook should do a better job handing over user information and proactively hunt down troublemakers. “We went back to email”.
