‎Brazil News

Simple National Application. Credit: Marcello Casal Júnior/Agência Brasil

Decision of the 1st Federal Court of Justice in Jaraguá do Sul, in Santa Catarina, confirmed last Thursday (10/26) by the 3rd Appeal Panel of the Special Federal Courts of Santa Catarina, ordered the Union to pay compensation for moral damages to a resident of Santa Catarina who had her name and CPF improperly used to register as an Individual Microentrepreneur (MEI). The sentence defined that the Union must pay R$5,000 in compensation and the Federal Revenue must cancel the registration.

 

The resident of São Bento do Sul, in Santa Catarina, detected in May 2021 that someone had used her data to open a MEI registry in Campinas, in the interior of São Paulo. At the time, she filed a police report and requested that the IRS suspend the CNJP, which only happened in May of the following year. Given the lack of administrative resolution of the problem, she filed a lawsuit in September 2022 alleging that the Union created a system that does not guarantee the necessary security to prevent anyone from using third party personal data in bad faith.

 

According to judge Sergio Eduardo Cardoso, from the 1st Federal Court of Justice in Jaraguá do Sul, the MEI registration situation had not been fully resolved at the administrative level until the beginning of November 2022, more than a year after the fraud was detected. “The situation highlights the inconvenience and feeling of insecurity for the author for a considerable period of time, going beyond the mere inconvenience or daily annoyance, in a way that constitutes moral damage”, wrote the judge.

 

 

In addition to the payment of compensation, Cardoso also determined that the Union, within 5 days, write off the CNPJ linked to the CPF of the plaintiff and exclude any pending issue relating to taxes.

 

The Union appealed the decision, but, last Thursday (26/10), the 3rd Appeal Panel of the Special Federal Courts of Santa Catarina, in a virtual session, unanimously decided to dismiss the appeal. The rapporteur was judge Oscar Alberto Mezzaroba Tomazoni.