Supreme Court Justice Cristiano Zanin authorized free access to Electoral Justice websites and official apps for prepaid mobile users whose data allowances have run out, covering the 72 hours before each election round and the 24 hours afterward.¹ The order applies to services including the Superior Electoral Court (TSE), regional electoral courts and the e-Título app.

The two accounts agree on the central compromise: voters will be able to reach official channels without being charged for data, but they will not receive unrestricted mobile internet. The broader request, brought by the National Confederation of Education Workers and the Green Party, had sought access regardless of data limits during the election period.¹

The left-leaning account frames the ruling as a partial response to concerns that exhausted data plans deny voters timely access to polling locations, electoral justifications and other information. Zanin said that “the impossibility of consulting official sources and using electoral services on voting days cannot be remedied after the vote.”¹ It also reports that civil-society groups challenged Anatel’s network-capacity warning, saying the agency had not specified the likely impact of universal access.¹

The right-leaning account emphasizes the operational case for narrower relief. It says Anatel warned that a general release could sharply increase traffic, potentially affecting emergency services as well as connections used by election workers and officials to conduct voting and transmit results.² It also notes that Zanin required the TSE to provide Anatel with any additional domains and apps deemed necessary, for distribution to mobile operators.²

There is a difference in how the sources describe the treatment of reduced-speed connections: one says Zanin favored reduced speed over a complete block, while the other says he rejected that alternative. Both, however, describe a final order confined to official Electoral Justice channels rather than a wider suspension of data restrictions.^{1 2}