Brazil approves new internet legislation

Brazilian senators vote on Internet Law

The Brazilian Senate has just approved the Civil Landmark of the Internet (Marco Civil da Internet), a subject that will for sure be on the cover of this wednesday Brazilian newspapers. The text of the law ensures net neutrality, even though it also opens the door for content discrimination in specific cases to be determined by presidential decree. The net neutrality -- the legal prohibition of discriminate data flow according to the type of content, such as slowing down Skype connections on mobile internet -- was the most sensitive subject of the law, a subject that now will be probably on the hands of the next Brazilian president to resolve.

The law also ensures the privacy of users and limits the liability of Internet Services Providers in cases of judicial process regarding third party's prejudicial content published online. There is an interesting mention that internet application providers (such as Facebook or Google) should not abuse in the use of private information of users (even if authorized by them). I would not be surprised to see in the future a civil lawsuit against one of the big internet companies in the country.

I'm curious to see how will be the coverage of the main newspapers tomorrow. The first time the text was approved on the Chamber of Deputies I noticed few of the criticism about the limited net neutrality (this I saw later on specialized publications). In fact, both O Globo and Folha were rather optimistic about it. In fact just now (as the subject is only on the online versions of the media, the attentions are focused to the victory of the government in surpassing the opposition maneuvers against the project.

-- update --

I just had a brief discussion with a friend  which was on the government during the public consultations of the internet law project. Basically the reason why they let the details of net neutrality to be determined by presidential decree was in order not to pass a rigid law that would have to be changed in the future due to technological developments. So net neutrality is still there as a principle and a set of rules which will have specific subsets of parameters and exceptions (Many thanks to Guilherme Almeida de Almeida).

As for the media coverage it was pretty modest, compared to the first approval. Since the text was not passed with many changes, newspapers sticked to describing the law and its concepts. Folha published an article from PSDB (opposition) senator Aloysio Nunes Ferreira arguing the law could be improved had the Senate more time to work on it. He said the privacy issue could be better defined, granting more protection to users.

-- end of update --

Catching-up

The Easter week I skipped publishing here was dominated by the Petrobras scandal (the refinery purchase that brought a billionaire loss to the company) and the presidential election forecasts, that again are dimming for Dilma. They both seem to be related, but in fact I hardly believe the average voter will put much weight on what is being done with the biggest company in the country.

On the Petrobras' front the most interesting development is a sort of discrepancy between the declarations of José Sérgio Gabrielli, Petrobras' former CEO and president Dilma Rousseff. Dilma said the Pasadena purchase was a bad business. This Sunday, in an interview to O Estado de S. Paulo, Gabrielli replied saying that Dilma was one of the board members and shared the same responsibility in the purchase. This was at least what O Estado de S. Paulo put in the headlines. I read the whole interview and could see Gabrielli saying the purchase was totally in acceptance with the 2006's context. But the contradiction surely was enough to be replicated by Folha de S. Paulo and O Globo on their monday editions.

Dilma's popularity falls, stock market goes up

Last week Dilma's popularity fell considerably. The percentage of people that evaluate positively her government dropped from 43% to 36% during the first quarter of the year. The survey news were picked up by the major newspapers in the country, namely O Globo and Folha de S. Paulo. Latter both newspapers said the slip in the president's approval (that means Dilma's reelection is under threat) was welcomed by the market, given the valuation of the national currency and the positive closure of the São Paulo stock exchange.

Stories about the 50 years of the military coup d'etat continued to be featured in the media. This monday, Dilma Rousseff, herself a victim of torture during the militar dictatorship period, defended the amnesty law (that basically prevented the conviction of military personnel involved in the dictatorship crimes, and was being questioned by the Bar in Brazil). Her past as a leftist militant is a trump she is likely to use again during the campaign. In her speech she addressed the two former presidents both also opponents from the dictatorship: Fernando Henrique Cardoso, whom she called an exiled, and Lula, whom she called a union leader. 

"I don't deserve to be raped", photos like
this were on social media to fight sexism

Dilma also used the internet on monday to address a victim of today's Brazil reminiscent conservatives, the journalist Nana Queiroz, that started last week a social media movement to raise awareness to a survey that showed 65% of Brazilian people believe a woman that has been raped deserved to be so either because she behaved or dressed inappropriately. Nana took a picture naked from the waste up, covering her breasts with a poster saying: I don't deserve to be raped. The campaign went viral, with several women adhering, and taking similar pictures. The problem was that Nana received several threats both from men and women, and decided to remove her page from Facebook. Using her Twitter, Dilma said Nana deserve respect and solidarity.

If in the dictatorship's speech and in the latter social media manifestations Dilma did good, the president's performance on the economic front continues to disappoint. The latest forecasts for inflation, featured in Folha de S. Paulo this Tuesday shows a 40% chance of the price index finishing the year above its 6,5% ceiling. It would be the first time this would happen since 2003, and a very bad sign for a government looking to win back the market. O Globo also featured another Achilles' heel of Dilma, the investigation over corruption in Petrobras, the big oil state company. The preliminary investigations from the company showed no sign of corruption in one of the two cases, the dutch platform supplier SBM bribe to Petrobras employees. 

Brazil ensures net neutrality

After years of discussion and six months being discussed as an urgent subject in the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies, the set of laws regulating the internet (known as the civil landmark of internet) was approved this Tuesday. The law still has to be approved by the senate, where the government has a more comfortable position. Its approval means the president was able to control the allies rebellion and also puts Brazil on the map of an international discussion over the issue of network neutrality (that has been opposing Internet Service Providers, as the Telecom companies, and Internet Companies, such as Google).

Activists celebrate the approval of the internet law
that ensures net neutrality in Brazil

Folha de S. Paulo front page today was about the law passing. The newspaper said it puts Brazil in the vanguard of the internet, calling the law a "constitution" of the internet. It mentions, though, that the text changed after the lobby of Google to remove the determination to nationalize data centers for all the business conducted in Brazil  -- which would impose that all virtual services had a local server in Brazil. This demand was not on the original project and was put in the text after the NSA scandal broke the news. It was supposed a political statement from Brazil, against the American surveillance.

O Globo said the law puts Brazil in the vanguard of the internet. The newspaper front page, though gave more space to the scandal on Petrobras, which just had one of its former directors, Paulo Roberto Costa, arrested because of a overpriced purchase of a refinery in Pasadena. The president of Petrobras, Maria das Graças Foster gave an exclusive interview for O Globo and stated it will investigate thoroughly the issue.

On the economic ground both newspapers also mentioned the reaction after Brazil had its national rating cut by Standard & Poor's. Contrarily to what might be expected the stock market and the currency reacted positively, because the market have already taken into account such measure from the rating agency.

Finally to complete the subjects covered in the media last week, the proximity of the 50 years of the military coup in Brazil motivated a series os special reports on the main media. Folha de S. Paulo again made a multimedia rich, Snowfall-like, special report on the military dictatorship, which is very interesting. The newspaper covers the whole process that led to the coup, trying also to put in context the role of the Brazilian left at that time, which was also fighting for its own revolution. The story also pointed out to the unsettled case of the amnesty to military torturers and brings the transcriptions of the US ambassador and presidents John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, both supporting the military coup. O Globo is publishing during this week a series of stories about the coup.

The latest election survey from Datafolha

It seems that after a major setback from the bad economic news to the protests, president Dilma's popularity is on the rise again. The latest survey from Datafolha, a research company of the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo, shows that the president would be successful among any candidate that is considered today. Dilma scores from 41% to 47% of the total votes' intentions. This means that she would defeat almost all of their opponents in the first round of the presidential elections with the exception of Marina Silva, that is currently being accounted most as a vice-president candidate for the Eduardo Campos candidacy.

Behind this more favorable scene are some recent change on the news, that were more optimists on later weeks. Finally the government concessions got out of the paper, with the airports and the first road segment (of BR-163)  being delivered to the private initiative. The inflation also seemed to be under control, with the market predictions falling down on the beginning of the week and the Central Bank raising interest rates to 10%, on another sign that the economic policy is searching for more credibility. 

In this scenario, the government authorized an increase of 2% on the gasoline prices by Petrobras, that was suffering with cash flow problems since it had to import the fuel with a higher price than consumers in Brazil pay for it. It is still not enough for the company's needs, market analysts said, but it is a sign that things are changing. 

Last but not least, the recent news that the statistics bureau IGBE is revising last year's growth from 0.9% to 1.5% also contributed to the change of humor this week. Let's hope that the country keeps on this track for the next year.

Oil and beagles

As predicted, the pre-salt oil auction had just one proposal, from a group headed by Petrobras. The other companies are the Chinese CNPC and Cnook, the anglo-dutch Shell and the French company Total. As Folha de S. Paulo revealed today the major companies ended up all together in the same group and that inhibited other competitors.

Despite lack of bids in the auction, president Dilma celebrated the result and rebuffed the critic to the model that puts a lot of responsibility on Petrobras (that is currently with a constrained budget). According to the president, the model has the merit of guaranteeing that 85% of the revenue from Libra oilfield will remain with the Brazilian state (which has 51% of Petrobras voting shares). The government also announced it will be with watching closely the oil exploration in the pre-salt, after O Globo denounced the subject was not covered by the auction summon.

Beagles

Enough with oil. I would like to comment a piece of news that is trending in the social media among Brazilian users. It’s the invasion of a research laboratory last Friday by a group of animal rights activists. They removed 178 beagles from the institution at dawn on Friday, saying they were victims of maltreatment.

Immediately after the news broke, on the weekend, hundreds of animal lovers shared their thoughts on the cruelty with animals. The scientific community responded saying there are few alternatives for research in some cases and condemned the invasion. Today O Globo says the federal deputy Ricardo Tripoli is holding a couple of beagles in his house and is advising the other 15 to 20 members of the group on legal matters. They will be indicted for the invasion of the laboratory. The police is also investigating the complaint of animal maltreatment.

Folha de S. Paulo, on the other hand is reporting that a beagle dog breeder in São Paulo, that the activists think is the provider of the laboratory’s dogs is in constant fear of having his own property invaded. He has already hired private security to prevent possible protests.

The subject is trending in social networks and generating heated discussions in each post favorable or contrary to the activists. In my point of view, invading a private property is not the way to deal with the subject. The activists themselves told they had inside information about the abuses. The best way then would be to proceed with the formal criminal complaints.

Even though I’m obviously contrary to animal maltreatment I also support experiments in animals, when there are no other alternatives. I mean, if that is what it takes to develop medicine that will save human lives, than it’s all right with me. Humankind has been killing and using animals for survival purposes since ancient times, and that is not likely to change soon.

Petrobras and the inflation

Expected to be one of the biggest players on the Libra oilfield auction that will take place on Monday, Petrobras is in a difficult position. The state controlled company has been crippled by the government interventions in its management -- from having to invest in areas that are not of its core interest, as ethanol, for example, to being impeded to raise gasoline prices because of the authorities fear of inflation. 

Petrobras is also in a tough position because of the new rules for oil exploration in the pre-salt area. The company is legally obliged to have a minimum share of 30% in all the fields. Since there are a lot of commitments still to be made, analists thing this will slow down the investment on future fields.

For this reason the government is cooking a new legislation to give some fiscal relief to Petrobras, according to Folha de S. Paulo. The company will probably not be taxed for the profits obtained from its foreign subsidiaries in the rent for equipment destined to the oil development in Brazil. There has been also some talk about another gasoline price increase to be allowed this year, but this is stil to be confirmed.