Internet censorship is violation of human rights, says Media Association

The Media Association’s Internet committee completed a report in July on Internet censorship in Turkey that called for amending Law No. 5651, which regulates the Internet, in a manner that would support freedom of thought and expression and in accordance with the Council of Europe‘s Convention on Cybercrime.

The report said that although access bans never work and YouTube remains the 10th most visited website in Turkey despite being banned by court order, the practice of forbidding websites blemishes the image of Turkey as a democratic nation.

The report noted that the Internet, which has no central administration, cannot be controlled by any individual, institution or government, although there have been attempts in almost every country in the world to classify Internet content according to their own priorities.

Law. No 5651, enacted in 2007, was initially devised to protect children from harmful content and to prevent the encouragement of suicide, prostitution and drug use, the report said. However, over time it has left Turkey with a ban on YouTube and paved the way for the restriction of Turkish society’s right to information, as courts can now block access to any content that they deem not to be in line with Turkish law. The report noted that blocking access was generally done through banning the domain name and Internet Protocol (IP) number of a particular site.

YouTube, Google woes

The report explained that Turkey has now been living with a ban on YouTube for three years, recalling that the ban was first instituted due to the online sharing of some videos deemed insulting to Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Republic of Turkey. However, the report said that despite the ban, Internet users in Turkey have been able to access the site and in fact YouTube remains one of the sites visited most frequently by Turkish Internet users.

The report also recalled that a court order blocking all IP addresses used by YouTube also restricted access to other online services belonging to Google and noted that officials defended the ban in the face of public outcry, arguing that Google does not pay taxes in Turkey in an attempt to change the public perception of the issue. The report said: “This view has developed a new notion in Turkish society that YouTube has been blocked because its owner, Google, does not pay taxes, whereas in reality the access block and the tax issues are independent of one another. The former has to do with freedom of thought, while the latter falls under the responsibility and authority of the Finance Ministry.”

What to do about bans

The report, in its recommendations section, acknowledges that the issue of Internet bans is a multifaceted problem but also says that it has now become clear that such censorship would never be able to bring the Internet under full control due to technological possibilities. The report noted that this discrepancy between court orders and the reality of users freely accessing banned sites also diminishes the confidence the public has in the law. The situation also mars Turkey’s reputation abroad, the report said and suggested the amendment of Law No. 5651, emphasizing that this amendment should be carried out through a transparent, participatory and pluralistic process that respects the right to freedom of thought and access to all forms of Internet content. The report also suggested that courts that specialize in Internet issues be established.

The report also called for full accreditation of Internet journalists by public agencies, saying Turkey’s Press Bulletin Authority (BİK) should create the necessary infrastructure to allow for the representation of online journalism in Turkey.

Internet usage in Turkey

According to figures provided in the report, around 28-30 million people over the age of 16 in Turkey are Internet users. The global figure for Internet usage is believed to have exceeded 1.8 billion people. According to the report, there are 3.1 million personal computers in the country. There are 215,000 domain names in Turkey and 870,000 that belong to Turks but are registered outside Turkey. Turkey ranks third in global MSN usage, after the United States and Brazil. Youths aged 15-25 spend a daily average of six hours on the Internet. A large portion of this time is spent with e-mail, reading online news and browsing social networking sites.

Globally, there are 733 million computers registered in the Internet domain name system and there are approximately 192 million domain names. The number of videos uploaded to the Internet exceeds hundreds of millions. The number of users has reached more than 500 million for Facebook, 105 million for Twitter and 50 million for LinkedIn.