WhatsApp has just escaped, for now, a legal intervention in Brazil. Judge Luiz de Moura Correia had ordered its complete shutdown across the entire territory after the company refused to cooperate with authorities, but a new injunction has revoked the ruling, citing jurisdictional problems and lack of proportionality.
The Dispute Behind the Block
There is no doubt that WhatsApp is the most popular instant messenger at the moment, with an estimated 700 million users, a number that keeps growing as smartphone penetration expands. As expected, all services similar to WhatsApp eventually run into some kind of legal trouble, even when circumstances don't directly involve them. The story that brings us here goes back to 2013, when the Civil Police Intelligence Center of the state of Piauí in Brazil asked WhatsApp for information needed to advance investigations into pedophilia. The company apparently refused to cooperate, and with the latest encryption system, delivering transcripts of conversations or the images exchanged through them is impossible. After repeated refusals by WhatsApp (and, by extension, Facebook), Judge Luiz de Moura Correia ordered on February 11, 2015 the total suspension of WhatsApp in Brazilian territory for not submitting to the current legal framework.
An Appeal Halts the Order
WhatsApp has no offices in that country, so the interruption had to be carried out through mobile phone carriers. These companies quickly appealed the measure, led by Telefónica Brasil, which argued that it lacked the technical conditions to block the service in less than 24 hours. Judges Raimundo Nonato da Costa Alencar and José Ribamar Oliveira acknowledged the companies' position, suspending the measure. They also added that the judge's original order fails to meet the basic requirements of proportionality, since the block could cause irreversible damage to both the service and its users, not to mention the jurisdictional conflicts that arise when a regional judge makes decisions at the national level.
The Underlying Problem Remains
Of course, WhatsApp has not resolved the underlying problem. An injunction is nothing more than a technical pause, and on its own it doesn't relieve the service of its legal responsibilities. According to the article published by O Globo, the next step is likely to be to elevate and reiterate the request for information to Facebook. Things are not going well between the social network and the Brazilian state. The judge who ordered the original suspension accused Facebook of "remaining inert" in the face of justice's demands, presenting as its only defense the lack of local offices. To be continued.
Source: O Globo
