WhatsApp blockade Brazil lifted earlier

The WhatsApp blockade that Brazilians had to deal with since Thursday has been lifted early by a judge. Access to WhatsApp’s services was blocked in order to pressure the company to release certain data.

Due to the blockade, which was supposed to last until midnight local time Friday, millions of people could no longer use the service. Providers had to block all WhatsApp traffic until then. More than 90 percent of the population online in the country uses the application, or more than 93 million people.

The judge in São Paulo who lifted the block did not think it was reasonable that millions of users were duped by this action because WhatsApp did not want to cooperate with a judicial investigation. A fine would also suffice, he said. Several news agencies report the lifting of the blockade. In the meantime, many alternative chat applications such as Viber, Skype, and Telegram have gained users. Also, many tried to use WhatsApp through a VPN.