But this useful tool has been largely inaccessible in recent days. The Telecommunications Board (TIB) recently imposed a slowdown on several Google services, extending the ban that has been in place against YouTube, which is owned by Google, for the past couple of years. Turkish Internet users could, until recently, circumvent the ban by accessing YouTube via a proxy server, but the new regulation closes that loophole. These online services are not just useful to individual surfers; they have commercial applications. Hotels use the maps on their websites to guide foreign visitors, banks can point their customers to the nearest ATM and many companies choose to store documents online so they can be easily viewed by their employees. In short, limiting access to such services is not just an inconvenience, it has become an economic issue.
The power of the Internet is well understood in Turkey. In the past five years, ADSL connections have increased four-fold and Turk Telekom announced only a few days ago that it was launching a new project, “Internet for every home,” to increase Internet penetration even further. E-commerce sales amounted to nearly TL 10 billion in the past year and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan recently gathered new media providers to promote his democratic opening, recognizing that the Internet is now a popular source of news.
But the government’s vision for the digital age has to be accompanied by a change of mentality. No one is disputing the need for adequate regulation of the Internet to prevent its use for criminal activities and to protect users’ privacy. Google recently landed in hot water in Germany after it was discovered that the roving cars it used for its Street View service had “mistakenly” been collecting private data from unsecure wifi networks. Facebook has also faced a storm of protests worldwide for its careless disregard for users’ privacy.
The legislation in place in Turkey, far from being attuned to the rapidly changing communications environment in which we live, is a blunt instrument that allows mass blocking of sites deemed to incite to suicide or to promote the sexual exploitation or abuse of children, drug use or obscenity. But it has mainly been wielded to curb freedom of expression for alleged “crimes against Atatürk.” Reporters without Borders, which has placed Turkey on its “countries under surveillance” list, describes the current approach as an “archaic form of control, which prevents Turks from accessing Web 2.0’s potential.”
Transportation Minister Binali Yıldırım further confused the issue by blaming Google for the current situation and suggesting that YouTube, which has been fined TL 30 million by the Finance Ministry, could speed up the lifting of the ban if it registered in Turkey and paid taxes.
So which is it? Is the ban based on anachronistic laws unsuited to the requirements of the digital age, or is the latest slowdown a means of pressure to convince the companies involved to sort out their tax status?
In either case, the real losers are Turkish Internet users and Turkey itself. “I do not want Turkey to be included among the countries that ban YouTube and prevent access to Google,” President Abdullah Gül was recently quoted as saying. “If there are problems due to our legislation, there should be ways to overcome that.” Let’s hope the government hears him.
