Brazil's federal government has filed a civil collective moral damages lawsuit against Discord, the chat, voice and video platform widely used by gamers and popular with teenagers, seeking 500 million reais — roughly $97 million — over what it says are failures to comply with laws protecting children and women, Reuters reported. Solicitor General Jorge Messias announced the action on Wednesday. Collective moral damages is a Brazilian legal avenue that lets public authorities claim redress for harm to society as a whole rather than for individual victims.

The suit follows an order issued this month by Brazil's National Data Protection Authority, the agency that enforces the country's LGPD data-protection law, requiring Discord to suspend livestreams and video calls in the country. That directive came after a 13-year-old girl died by suicide following a broadcast in which, according to authorities, she was encouraged to harm herself. Discord filed an appeal against the suspension on Monday, and the agency told AFP the appeal is under review.

Brazil is using the courts to go beyond the regulator's penalty cap

The damages sought exceed what the data protection authority itself could impose. The regulator opened its probe in early August on the recommendation of the Digital Rights Secretariat, giving Discord five days to show how it protects children and teenagers, with penalties of up to 50 million reais for noncompliance, MLex reported. The agency ordered the suspension on August 12, and Discord complied on August 17, saying it was seeking a solution that would allow the features to return.

By taking the matter to court for ten times the administrative maximum, the government is reaching past the limits of its own regulator.

TikTok was hit with a $30 million child-data fine the day before

The Discord suit arrived in the middle of a week of intensified enforcement. On Tuesday, the authority fined TikTok 153.7 million reais — close to $30 million — for irregularities in processing the data of children and adolescents, and ordered ByteDance to delete data collected in breach of the rules, according to AFP.

The regulator estimated that the company may have processed data from as many as 8 million children and cited flaws in its age verification process. TikTok has 10 days to appeal. The company has said it will comply with new rules that include tougher default privacy settings for users under 16, increased parental controls, and enhanced content filtering.

The fine came after TikTok agreed last week to pay $400 million to settle a separate US Justice Department case over children's privacy.

Twenty-two platforms are now under scrutiny as enforcement widens

Agency director Lorena Giuberti Coutinho said proceedings began last week to check whether 22 social media networks and platforms comply with a child protection law Brazil passed this year. Sanctioned by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in July, the law sets 14 as the minimum age for opening a social media account, requires accounts belonging to users under 16 to be linked to a parent's account, and obliges platforms to verify ages.

"I think we can expect much stronger enforcement action in the months ahead." — Lorena Giuberti Coutinho

Brazil is moving in step with a broader international tightening on child safety online: Australia is set to begin enforcing a ban on social media accounts for users under 16 in December, and the UK's Online Safety Act has introduced age-check requirements for platforms serving British users.

Brazil has moved against large platforms before. X was blocked in the country for 40 days in 2024 until it complied with Supreme Court orders to remove accounts accused of spreading disinformation. Separately, the consumer rights group Collective Defense Institute is seeking 3 billion reais from the Brazilian units of TikTok, Kwai, and Meta over minors' use of their services.