Brazil Imposes 48-Hour Blackout of WhatsApp Messaging Application

Local Editor

The WhatsApp messaging application has been shut down in Brazil for 48 hours after a judge in Sao Paulo ordered telecommunications companies to block the service, The Verge reports.

The blackout will be in effect starting from midnight on Thursday local time.

Telecommunications companies had been trying to convince the Brazilian government that the highly popular messaging application, which has a free calling option, is illegal.

Because of the free service, WhatsApp has been drawing customers, particularly the youth and the poor, away from cellphone contracts.

According to TechCrunch, WhatsApp has about 93 million users in Brazil, which is 93 percent of the country's internet population.

WhatsApp was founded in 2009 and was acquired by Facebook in February 2014. The messaging application for smartphones is the most globally popular with about 900 million users.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team