A court in Sao Paolo on Thursday lifted a ban it had imposed the day before on WhatsApp, a messaging application used by 93 million people in the country. On Wednesday, it had asked Brazilian mobile phone operators to block the app, claiming WhatsApp had refused to cooperate in a criminal case.
The court had released a statement saying: "WhatsApp did not respond to a court order dated 23 July, 2015. On August 7, 2015, the company was notified again of being subject to fixed penalty in case of non-compliance."
Mark Zuckerberg, chief executive officer of Facebook, which owns the app, had said he was stunned by the "extreme ruling".
According to the BBC, the app is accessed by 93% of Internet users in the country. Many citizens took to Twitter to complain about the ban and made wry comments about how dependent they had become upon the service.
Mobile phone operators in the country have also been urging the government to restrict the use of the app, saying its free Internet-based call feature eats into their revenues.
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