RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – After his provisional measure (MP) preventing the unilateral deletion of posts on social networks was rejected by Congress, President Jair Bolsonaro has sent parliamentarians a text with the same principles, but now in the form of a bill that could become law if adopted by both houses of Congress.
In a communication from the General Secretariat of the Presidency, the government explains that the proposal intends to establish “benchmarks” for content censorship by social network providers but not to prevent the removal of posts.
In addition, according to the bill, the provider must inform the user of the removal and allow them to appeal the decision. The full text of the bill was not provided by the Presidential Palace.
Unlike the MP, which takes effect upon publication, the project must now be reviewed and approved by congressmen and senators before it can go into effect. However, the proposal is not likely to have an easy time in Congress. In passing the new election law last week, lawmakers opted to remove from the text several articles that dealt with the same issue.
The PM, released on the eve of the September 7 presidential rallies, stipulated that there must be a “legitimate reason” for the deletion of content and prohibited the deletion of publications for reasons that could be considered “censorship of a political, ideological, scientific, artistic or religious nature.”
There is ever greater chatter on the Internet about how America’s tech giants such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube are deleting, around the world, without warning, any posts on social media that do not conform to what they have determined as the mainstream narrative. The tech companies say it is “moderation”, but those affected say it is classic censorship.
Especially on Covid-19, all alternative information is rigorously censored under the pretext that it is misinformation.
This, and the fact that WhatsApp, for example, spies on its users, has already led to WhatsApp competitors like Telegram or Signal experiencing a veritable explosion of new users, all of whom are turning their backs on WhatsApp.
Politically right-leaning people around the world, in particular, are leaving Facebook and Twitter in droves because they are fed up with what they call the invasion of privacy, surveillance capitalism, political bias, targeting, and newsfeed manipulation by these companies.
In the U.S., platforms like MeWe, the social network launched as a privacy-friendly alternative to Facebook, and Rumble – conservative commentator Dan Bongino’s answer to YouTube – as well as CloutHub, another platform favored by the right, are being welcomed with open arms by those who believe who are censored and banned by the major social media apps.