A top court in Brazil ordered an immediate, country-wide suspension of the X platform on Friday after a months-long legal battle with Elon Musk’s social media company over content moderation, according to Bloomberg.
The court added that anyone using VPN to access the X platform would be subject to daily fines of 50,000 reais — $8,900 — though it’s not clear how it would enforce the decree.
Earlier this month, X closed its operations in Brazil in protest against court orders asking it to remove accounts that allegedly spread misinformation. At the time, the company said Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes “threatened our legal representative in Brazil with arrest if we do not comply with his censorship orders.” Moraes warned X earlier this week that Brazil would ban the service if the company did not name a legal representative in the country.
“Soon, we expect Judge Alexandre de Moraes will order X to be shut down in Brazil, simply because we would not comply with his illegal orders to censor his political opponents,” said X’s global affairs team in a tweet Friday morning.
The platform says it will publish the Brazilian top court’s demands in the coming days and will not comply with its orders.