Abstract

With the advent of the Brazilian Civil Rights Framework for the Internet, there was undeniable progress in the regulation of digital environment-related issues, especially regarding the establishment of rules aimed at protecting the right to privacy of Internet users. With the purpose of prioritizing freedom of expression, the MCI adopted the judicial notice and takedown model as a standard, which holds digital platforms civilly liable only after non-compliance with a judicial order requiring the removal of allegedly illegal content, as opposed to the notice and takedown system previously applied by Brazilian case law. This legislative innovation has sparked criticism, as the requirement for a prior judicial order makes the process of removing offensive content slower and more bureaucratic, hindering the prompt protection of victims' fundamental rights. This controversy, thus, reached the Federal Supreme Court through Extraordinary Appeal nº 1.037.396/SP, Theme 987 of general repercussion, whose judgment, still pending, will play a crucial role in defining the limits of digital platforms' civil liability in Brazil. In this context, this article aims to analyze the (un)constitutionality of Article 19 of Law nº 12.965/2014, which conditions the civil liability of application providers on the non-compliance with a specific judicial order. The research adopts a qualitative approach, based on bibliographic review and the analysis of the electronically available vote of Minister Dias Toffoli, the case's rapporteur at the Court.

Keywords

• Brazilian Civil Rights Framework for the Internet, Civil Liability, Unconstitutionality, Theme 987.

License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.