By Mauricio Savarese and Eléonore Hughes
Brazil, Brazil (AP) – Most of Brazil’s Supreme Court justice has agreed to hold social media companies liable for illegal postings by users.
A top Brazilian court has decided to control two different cases to help them understand how to deal with social media companies as reports of fraud, child pornography and violence have become ramped online among teenagers. Critics warn that such measures could threaten freedom of speech as the platform preemptively removes content that could become an issue.
Gilmer Mendes on Wednesday became the sixth of 11 court judges who vote to pave the way for companies like Meta, X and Microsoft to pay fines for content they have published. Voting is ongoing, but only a simple majority is everything the measure needs to pass.
The ruling comes after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned about possible visa restrictions on foreign authorities allegedly involved in censoring American citizens. One such official reportedly is Brazilian Judge Alexandre des Mores, who took action against social media outlets who believed they were not complying with Brazilian laws.
The only opposing Brazilian justice to date is Andre Mendonza, and his vote was released last week. The court has not yet decided how such regulations will be enacted.
Mendonça said freedom of speech on social media is key to making information public “held to explain powerful public institutions, including governments, political elites and digital platforms.”
Judge Flavio Dino, who first voted on Wednesday, reminded his colleagues that recent cases of school shootings in Brazil have been stimulated on social media. He read a post from one user who said he was happy by seeing his family of dead children “crying, bleeding, dying.”
“I don’t think social media is coming close to what humanity has produced in the best ways,” he said.
Social media proposals become law once the vote is finished, and the results will be made public. However, Brazilian parliament can pass another law to reverse the measures.
According to current law, social media companies can only be liable if they do not remove dangerous content after a court order.
Public debate over social network regulations rose in Brazil in the aftermath of the January 8th 2023 riots. This comes when former president Geabolsonaro supporters plundered the Congress, the Presidential Palace and the Supreme Court in Brasilia, the capital.
Alvaro Palma de Jorge, a law professor at the Rio-based Getulio Vargas Foundation and think tanks and universities, says the platform needs to be proactive in content regulation.
“They should adopt certain precautions that are not compatible with simply waiting for a judge to issue a decision that ultimately orders that remove that content,” Palma de Jorge said.
Wednesday’s ruling brings a big approach to Brazil’s big technology, closer to the European Union’s approach that has been trying to curb the power of social media companies and other digital platforms.
The rendering of the platform could be automatically responsible for the content on the platform, according to the Brazilian Office of Digital Economy, which is based in Sao-Paulo, an organization representing the digital economy sector.
“This type of liability supports large companies with robust legal structures that undermine small national players that have negative impacts on competition,” the organization said, adding that the decision could increase barriers to innovation.
Hughes reported from Rio de Janeiro.
Original issue: June 11, 2025, 6:55pm EDT
