The block party: how Big Tech’s lobby avoided regulation in Brazil

Over the past decade, big technology companies have built robust government relations teams in Brazil, establishing a lobbying system that has achieved repeated success in blocking regulations contrary to their interests in Congress.

A data investigation by Núcleo identified a network of 75government relation professionals hired by 15major tech companies, working directly on corporate engagement with the Executive and Legislative branches. This investigation was as part of the project The Invisible Hand of Big Tech, an effort led by Agência Pública and the Centro Latinoamericano de Investigación Periodística (CLIP).

Two out of every threeof these professionals have worked in government entities, such as the Presidency, ministries, legislatures or regulatory agencies, a practice known as revolving door.

About half of the professionals were hired between 2021 and 2023, a period when efforts to push through major regulations, such as bill 2630/2020 (also known as the Fake News Bill, or, in Portuguese, PL das Fake News), intensified among supportive lawmakers and civil society groups. In 2024, the Fake News Bill was declared ‘dead’ by the then president of Brazil’s House of Representatives, Arthur Lira.

Revolving door is the name given to the movement of professionals between public and private positions, especially between government roles and lobbying sectors.

A new data investigation

The lobbying data was obtained through extensive LinkedIn searches using a social media research method known as snowball sampling, which makes it possible to find a network of specific profiles through platform recommendation algorithms. Only professionals who declared themselves to be part of public policy and government relations teams, or similar classifications, were added to the dataset.

This is the first publicly-available investigation of its kind in Brazil and shows the scale of influence by direct Big Tech hires on national politics.

The names of the professionals were omitted from this report to avoid exposing people who are legally doing their jobs.

It’s important to note that these companies may have professionals without active LinkedIn accounts or who don’t declare their employment ties or positions on the platform, which could underestimate the final number of people found.

The numbers account for only direct company hires, and not those from lobbying organizations such as the Digital Council (or Conselho Digital, funded by major technology companies), the Brazilian Chamber of Digital Economy, and the Brazilian Association of Mobility and Technology, among others.

Another finding is the presence of professionals specialized in lobbying coming from other sectors. At least eleven were identified as having previous worked in lobbying for oil, mining, tobacco, and banking sectors.

The influence of this group is corroborated by interviews with people who directly participated in the negotiations that led to the downfall of Bill 2630. To report on the behind-the-scenes details, they requested anonymity and also revealed that technology company lobbyists, in addition to bringing this experience from other sectors, also pressured major national confederations if little relation to technology to also act against the bill.

In the midst of these negotiations were, for example, discussions about data center construction. “It was a very clear quid pro quo there, there was an exchange on the table,” reported one person involved in the negotiations.

Meta’s overreach

According to our investigation, Meta is the company with the largest contingent of professionals working in public policy or government relations positions in Brazil – that is, people whose job is to coordinate and attempt to influence government and legislative actions regarding their areas of interest.

The company has at least 19 government relations employees, followed by Google with 10 people – if we include YouTube, which belongs to the online search company, the total goes to 13.

Both companies were exceptionally aggressive in their campaigns against the Fake News Bill between 2022 and 2024, waging a true battle against the legislation that sought to give new responsibilities to these companies.

Google even hired former Brazilian President Michel Temer as an emissary in Brasília to block the legislation, in addition to running an blog post against the bill on its homepage, which led to investigations by Brazilian authorities for abusive practices. Meanwhile, Meta published full-page ads in newspapers and advertised against the bill in the capital’s airports.

In early May 2023, over a 10-day period, several statements were released by companies and related organizations criticizing the bill in order to pressure congressmen against new regulations.

Also noteworthy is the presence of TikTok and Uber, which each have seven government relations professionals.

Lobbying evolution

Rafael Zanatta, a researcher and director at Data Privacy Brasil, a non-profit organization, said that he has been following the evolution of lobbying in the sector since 2015, when discussions about the General Data Protection Law, the LGPD, began.

“What we noticed back then was, first, a professionalization of lobbying that was no longer just tax-focused lobbying. Take for example, Brascom, which is an association with the likes of IBM and Microsoft. They grew a lot, I think they have over 90 members now. They started gaining prominence and specializing in undermining the (regulatory) process,” said Zanatta, recalling the discussions that aimed to derail the LGPD implementation.

For the companies, it was in their interest at the time not to have many rules on personal data usage. However, the law ended up approved in August 2018. All the lobbying by tech companies has only grown since then.

Zanatta explains that some of the difficulties lie, above all, in the lack of definition and regulation of lobbying activity itself in Brazil. He points out how even the concept itself is initially a problem.

“Lobbying is advocating for a cause before a decision-maker and is not a crime in itself,” he said, recalling that Brazil has no lobbying regulation. The researcher also observes that, in American law, for example, among other aspects, public, democratic and equitable advocacy for a cause is warranted, but with certain rules.

“What is not allowed is having dinner in Lisbon, for example, or producing something exclusively for a parliamentarian or drafting texts that a parliamentary’s aide then presents specifically for a bill,” said Zanatta, mentioning that this in fact happens in Brazil.

The strength of lobbying in tech comes along a major concern of not allowing any regulation to advance in any country that could influence a worldwide movement for this type of legislation.

Andressa Michelotti, doctoral candidate at the Political Science Department of the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) and researcher at Margem (Democracy and Justice Research Group) explains: “Regarding bill 2630 (the fake news bill), they (the companies) want to avoid any precedent. Because if a platform regulation law passes in Brazil, it could have an effect on the Global South,” she points out. “Brazil has this influence. It’s something I saw a lot in my research. If such a law passes in Europe, the next stop is Brazil,” she notes.

This aspect is also highlighted by Bia Barbosa, advocacy coordinator for Reporters Without Borders (RSF) for Latin America. For her, the sector’s lobbying to prevent regulation is “unprecedented” in the country. “This is heavy lobbying by the companies. It was even an international priority to block the vote here in Brazil. It was a determination by the teams here that this law (on fake news) should not advance because of Brazil’s influence in the region,” she concludes.