Federal Police launch operation against racism and threats online

Federal Police agents took to the streets on Thursday (May 10) in six Brazilian cities as part of an operation against crimes committed online. The individuals brought under scrutiny in Operation Bravado will answer to the crimes of criminal association, threat, racism, and incitement to crime.

The suspects are reported to have used website and online forums to encourage crimes like rape, the murder of women and black people, and acts of terrorism.

Investigators say there is evidence that the investigated were responsible for “bomb threats sent to a number of universities across the country.”

Intolerance 

The crackdown Thursday is a development of Operation Intolerance, carried out in 2012, an investigation that targeted people involved in the same wrongdoing. Today, the police discovered that the individuals under scrutiny had connections with those arrested in the 2012 operation. They are believed to use of the same websites as well as new internet pages.

Some 60 Federal Police agents served preventive arrest warrants and eight search and seizure orders in the cities of Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, and Vila Velha, in the Southeast; Santa Maria and Curitiba, in the South; and Recife, in the Northeast.

The crackdown was named after the way in which suspects intimidated their victims, with “insolent threats, bravado, boastfulness, presumption, arrogance, and pretended courage.”