WhatsApp, the world’s most popular mobile messenger app, on Thursday announced proxy support for all users. This will help people preserve access to the app if connections are blocked or disrupted by government restrictions.
WhatsApp’s official blog specifically mentions the actions of a single country: “Disruptions like we’ve seen in Iran for months on end deny people’s human rights and cut people off from receiving urgent help.” Iran has blocked access to apps such as Instagram and WhatsApp in an attempt to curb a growing protest movement.
WhatsApp is the most popular messaging app in Brazil. Per think tank InternetLab, 99.8 percent of smartphones in Brazil have it installed.
The service has been suspended nationwide by trial court injunctions three separate times between 2015 and 2016. On all those occasions, the judges ruled that the app’s parent company had refused to comply with police investigations. Also, in all cases, the injunctions were struck down by higher court judges in under 24 hours. The suspensions led millions of users to download Telegram, WhatsApp’s main competitor.
In another watershed case, a court order in early 2007 suspended access to YouTube in Brazil at the request of a former TV celebrity, an intimate video of whom had leaked online. The decision was struck down five days later.
During the 2022 elections, Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered Telegram to be suspended in Brazil for failing to comply with court orders. After the injunction, the company quickly named a legal representative in Brazil and announced token measures to curb misinformation. Justice Moraes backed down before the deadline for carriers to ban the app.
Brazil’s Superior Electoral Court partnered with social media companies in a permanent program to fight disinformation. These include Google and Meta — the parent company for Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.
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