One of the most popular in the world. Social network X has gone offline in Brazil, the country with the fifth-largest digital population, after Elon Musk’s refusal to comply with local laws meant it was blocked by the Supreme Court.
Millions of Brazilian X users found themselves unable to access the network on Saturday morning as internet providers and mobile phone companies began enforcing the ban.
When the Guardian tried to access the network from its computer and mobile phone, it received a message saying: “It seems you have lost connection. We will keep trying.”
Many Brazilians sought refuge on rival network Bluesky, which reported gaining 500,000 users in the past two days. “Welcome to Bluesky!” the company posted in Portuguese to its new followers.
Among Bluesky’s new members is Felipe Neto, one of Brazil’s top social media influencers, with over 17 million followers on X. “Don’t forget, when you go to another country, you are obliged to comply with their legislation, even if you don’t agree with it,” Neto wrote.
The ban on X, which has more than 22 million users in Brazil, is the climax of a months-long political fight between the country’s highest court and the right-wing tech billionaire.
Alexandre de Moraes, the influential Supreme Court judge responsible for the ban, had led an effort to force X to purge anti-democratic and far-right voices in the wake of the January 2023 uprising in the capital Brasilia carried out by supporters of far-right former President Jair Bolsonaro.
Musk, who has aligned himself with right-wing figures such as Bolsonaro and his US ally Donald Trump, hit back by accusing Moraes of stifling free speech and trying to censor conservative views. Musk’s public attacks on Moraes — many of them childish and vulgar — were reminiscent of his repeated online barbs at British Prime Minister Keir Starmer during recent far-right riots in the U.K., which the X owner was accused of stoking.
The final straw before X’s blockade in Brazil came on Thursday, when Musk ignored a 24-hour deadline to appoint a new legal representative after the social media platform closed its local office in mid-August. Friday’s ruling In ordering the ban, Moraes accused X of treating the social network “as a no-man’s land, a true lawless land” by allowing the “massive spread” of disinformation, hate speech and anti-democratic attacks.
Hours later, shortly after midnight local time, Brazilian users began noticing that X had expired.
Musk escalated his attacks on Moraes, calling the judge “Voldemort” and tweeting a meme of a dog dangling its scrotum on another animal’s face.
“He is a dictator and a fraud, not a judge,” Musk wrote on X, although Brazilian users could no longer read his words without using a virtual private network (VPN).
Leading right-wing voices have joined Musk’s side, underlining the growing affinity between Brazil’s far right and the world’s richest person.
“I’m going to radicalize myself, even if I do it on my own,” Nikolas Ferreira, a prominent right-wing congressman, promised hours before X was blocked. “You’re a freedom fighter,” Musk replied.
Progressive Brazilians mocked Musk’s claim to defend free speech, and many welcomed the Supreme Court’s decision to show the X owner he was not above the law.
“If billionaires want to own companies that make billions in these places, they must learn to respect the law. Long live the rule of law and national sovereignty,” wrote left-wing congresswoman Erika Hilton on Channel X on Friday night.
In a second farewell message, posted about half an hour before the ban went into effect, Hilton announced that she had moved to Bluesky. “See you there soon,” she wrote.
