Brazil fines Telegram for not suspending the account of far-right congressman

• Telegram failed to suspend the account of a far-right elected official.
• Ferreira has over 300,000 Telegram subscribers.
• He frequently shares evangelical and far-right content.

Brazil: According to a Supreme Court statement, Brazil’s Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes fined Telegram on Wednesday for failing to suspend the account of a far-right elected official and social media influencer.

Earlier in January, the court ordered Telegram to suspend Nikolas Ferreira’s and other accounts “to stop the spread of criminal manifestations,” according to a statement.

Failure to suspend Ferreira’s account “is regarded as indirect collaboration to the continuation of criminal activities,” according to the court.

Ferreira, a federal representative from the state of Minas Gerais, has over 300,000 Telegram subscribers, 3.6 million Tik Tok followers, and over 6 million Instagram followers. He frequently shares evangelical and far-right content, as well as his support for former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.

Authorities in Brazil are still investigating after hundreds of Bolsonaro supporters stormed government buildings in Brasilia earlier this month, following his defeat in a presidential run-off vote last year.

Ferreira’s social media prowess has aided his political career; in 2022, he received the most votes of any representative running nationwide, and the third most votes cast for any representative in Brazilian history.

Tweeting about the case Wednesday, Ferreira wrote, “They want to disappear me from the internet”.

Telegram is being fined

According to a Supreme Court press release, Telegram will be fined 100,000 Brazilian reais (approximately $20,000) per day of noncompliance.

Telegram responded to Moraes in a letter obtained by CNN Brasil, requesting that the order be reconsidered.

It emphasizes Ferreira’s status as an elected official and states that no specific criminal content was found in the order. “No grounds or justifications for the complete blocking of the said channel were provided, that is, the specific contents that would be considered illegal were not presented,” according to the letter.

The Supreme Court acknowledged Telegram’s partial compliance with the order but asked for clarification on which specific content to block.

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