Turkey blocks social media again to stall protests, here’s how to access them

https://techcrunch.com/2016/11/04/turkey-blocks-social-media-again-to-stall-protests-heres-how-to-access-them/

by endswapper • 10 years ago

93 54 10 years ago

techcrunch.com

rch• 10 years ago

Keep in mind this is a government we're currently selling weapons to:

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-lockheed-fighter-turkey-id...

simonsarris2• 10 years ago

Presumably the US is selling/arming Kurds that are rebelling against the regime, too. This was one of the emails released yesterday, though it is dated 2014:

https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/43648#efmAtVAz1

> On Aug 17, 2014 3:50 PM, "H" <hrod17@clintonemail.com> wrote:
>> 3. In the past the USG, in an agreement with the Turkish General Staff,
>> did not provide such heavy weapons to the Peshmerga, out of a concern that
>> they would end up in the hands of Kurdish rebels inside of Turkey. The
>> current situation in Iraq, not to mention the political environment in
>> Turkey, makes this policy obsolete. Also this equipment can now be
>> airlifted directly into the KRG zone.

Point 5. is missing from that email, for whatever reason.

frandroid• 10 years ago

The KRG, despite being Kurds, are besties with the Turkish government (a pipeline going out of Iraqi Kurdistan exports oil through Turkey), and rather at loggerheads with the PKK (Kurdish rebels in Turkey), so there's little chance of the weapons passing from the KRG to the PKK.

atakurt• 10 years ago

yeah ,keep going keeping in mind , what were you doing with weapons at afghanistan , iraq , vietnam ? spreading democracy ?

pjc502• 10 years ago

Well, they're in NATO and the crucial barrier between the "West" on one side and Syria & Russia on the other.

pgtruesdell• 10 years ago

Turkey's current political climate is endemic of the region. It's a molotov cocktail waiting for a lighter.

toyg• 10 years ago

Technically it's already been lit, it's just not as big a fire as it could be. I mean: Turkey is at war, Russia is at war, Saudi Arabia is at war, Qatar is at war, NATO is at war, Syria is a warzone, Iraq is a warzone... we're lucky the big guns are somewhat not pointed at each other, which would literally be WW3, but the area is already burning alright.

jwtadvice5• 10 years ago

Also take a look through the AKP Party's emails, which led to the discovery of a backchannel between Erdogan and Assad (and subsequently) the recent Turkish military coup attempt: https://wikileaks.org/akp-emails/

acqq5• 10 years ago

backchannel between Erdogan and Assad

Can you elaborate on this? There are 300,000 emails behind your link.

Backchannels aren't necessarily bad. The communication on various levels is necessary even between the countries that at are at war. And, to my knowledge, only the US and the Sunni oil countries are basically against Assad, the EU is just acknowledging whatever the US wills.

jwtadvice5• 10 years ago

Turkey (presumably) cut all diplomatic ties with Syria in September 2011.

Pekin (former head of the Turkish Military Intelligence) and other high level officials had a backchannel to Assad for the administration, and were associated with parties and policies that had been trying to normalize relations between the countries.

This was discovered the week of the military coup attempt.

DasIch2• 10 years ago

If there being such a back channel is a surprise to you, you should really reconsider whether you know anything about foreign policy at all.

xnull2guest2• 10 years ago

Agreed. If the backchannel is news or surprising to you, you're probably just following and regurgitating someone else's propaganda.

Agreed with the OP: read original sources like Wikileaks.

finid• 10 years ago

Erdogan is trying to stall protests, but protesters saved his rear end just a few months ago.

msc1• 10 years ago

there are multiple reports of cable internet subscribers' speed is downgraded to 1,44 mbps.

http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/5771998066

plandis• 10 years ago

Surely 1.44 Mbps is enough bandwidth to access Twitter in a timely manner unless that bandwidth is heavily over-subscribed.

ysleepy• 10 years ago

Seems like a good time for the technical community to reassess its contribution to the situation and how we can do better.

How were communication services used by individuals and the state?

Did the threat model encompass the seen actions and techniques?

Which companies collaborated?

I see a lot of responsibility on our side to do better.

throwawayfromtr• 10 years ago

It is pretty clear now that the Turkey's Islamic government was behind the fake coup. They have used this to hit all of their opposition without worrying about laws (state of emergency = do whatever you want)

1. Complete clear all Gulen cult members from their infiltrated state positions

2. Hit secular Turks (Cumhuriyet newspaper behind bars this week)

3. Hit Kurdish opposition ( Kurdish party members behind bars this week)

Now that they are fighting in three big fronts. There is no way for them to succeed. On the other hand, if they win, this is the end of the secular, democratic Turkish Republic (which pretty much eroded on all those counts since the Islamic party came the power)

cm32• 10 years ago

overnment was behind the fake coup.

Has this been proven yet? I'm under the impression that we're still in the stages of better not believing any side of the arguments because any secrets - if they exist - will be fresh and well hidden for the moment. If you ask me, I would be very careful claiming to know who orchestrated what.

prefect42• 10 years ago

What is a "Islamic party"? Turkey is something like 96% Muslim population, so chances are, any particular cross section of society might just be called "Islamic" something, including the government.

pjc502• 10 years ago

Confusion between "Islamic" and "Islamist" here I think; the first simply has Islam as a religion and the second uses it as a hammer.

Compare Germany's Christian Democrats (the former) and, say, Pat Buchanan (the latter).

gkya2• 10 years ago

That 96% is the amount of people registered as Muslims, and the religion status are registered at birth as parents declare. Further, who's not a registered Christian or Jewish is considered a Muslim by default. So that 96% includes: atheists, converts to religions other than those of book (Islam, Christianity, Judaism), Alawites (10 million of them, and Turkey's population is 70million), secularists and the non practising Muslims (edit: i.e. who are only nominally Muslim because parents are).

cm32• 10 years ago

Genuinely curious, only serious answers, please: can someone living in Turkey explain how the government can justify ordering a ban while publicly using Twitter themselves? What am I missing?

zubi• 10 years ago

They are not "banning" in the sense of disallowing or prohibiting. They just slow it down to the point where it is no more usable. Media is only as good as they serve to the needs of the government.

As for the justification, nowadays they don't really justify anything, they just do, and it doesn't matter if it is unlawful or not. Especially after the coup attempt, there's this state of emergency situation which allows the government to bypass the parliament which pretty much translates to no justification for anything, capability is enough and it is not difficult to find stuff to use as pretext. Many of the government's recent actions are gross violations of constitution and several other laws, all possible due to the emergency status.

ozgung3• 10 years ago

Exactly. The real answer to the question is: they don't care and they don't need to explain anything

brian_cloutier• 10 years ago

To add to the other answer you received, Turkey was in the habit of blocking social media after things like bombings well before the state of emergency was announced.

A bombing just happened, which could explain this current round of blocks: http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11/04/asia/turkey-kurdish-leader...

I'm reading from this site: http://www.amerikaninsesi.com/a/internet-erisiminin-yavaslat... (sorry for the Turkish)

The official power comes from a statue which allows restricting communication when "made necessary for national security purposes or a situation arises which might seriously impact social order", this was the justification for blocking after the bombing at Ataturk airport. People sharing videos and images of attacks is not good for the public morale, and that's ostensibly such an important concern that it merits blocking social media.

This current round of blocks has suspicious timing and extent but as my sibling points out, it's a state of emergency, they don't need justification.

mustafaucar876• 10 years ago

As a Turkish, there are so much hate going into most of the people's comments going on here.

I am a Turkish citizen and i live there so without the actual experience, most of the things said here is not true and heavily biased.

The people that got arrested last night were actively tied to terrorist organization called PKK and execute under their command. How would you feel there was a senator in your country representing such terrorist organization and continue to do so because he was untouchable because he was elected? How would you feel you left you house or dorm scared that you would be blown into pieces on your way to school or some errand etc?

Those people are widely connected and their supporters are trying to organize violent acts via social media.

Another thing is Turkey is %90+ muslim so It is very odd that people call Erdogan islamist. So what? It is a muslim country. People actually voted for him(including myself and most of the people i know). It is peoples beliefs. You dont say things about Obama or Bush 'Oh he is a Christian Leader' every time you have a conversation that has a negative context.

ozgung3• 10 years ago

Thanks Mr. Government supporting PR account. People ilke you are the main reason we are ashamed of and hopeless about our own country.

And if you are serious, definitely we are not living in the same country. I envy you.

BTW, Islamist does not mean Muslim. It's a political ideology. And it's not a democratic one. Erdogan is definitely an Islamist politician.

Edit: And Kurdish politicians and their leader are not terrorists at all. They have never been considered as terrorists since today. Only reason they are on target now is because Erdogan is obsessed with changing the regime and becoming the president while Kurdish party hinders that. The truth in Turkey is as simple as this.

mustafaucar876• 10 years ago

Yes i support my government. I am not going to be ashamed of it and proudly continue to do so. May be you should start supporting it too instead backing a situation where it is about fighting against a terrorist organization.

Freestyler_3• 10 years ago

Watch out, if you disagree with government you are a terrorist supporter.

There is a whole list of things that are wrong with the democratic process in Turkey, one of them is the silencing of political parties & media.

tdkl• 10 years ago

One mans "terrorist organization" is another mans "freedom fighters" for their people on this planet.

itaifrenkel• 10 years ago

That's not entirely precise. There might be different freedom organizations that agree on the cause, but disagree on the methods to achieve it. If this is the case (and in many cases it is) then there is a difference.

Symbiote• 10 years ago

Turkey is supposed to be a secular country, but unfortunately in the last decade this has been gradually weakened.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secularism_in_Turkey#Weakening...

I openly criticise any leader who allows ancient myths to influence their actions, no matter which millennia-old stories they choose.

mustafaucar876• 10 years ago

Turkey will only be what its people want it to be. Not some people who are not its citizens think it needs to be.

ozgung3• 10 years ago

Except Erdogan and his anti-secular movement was a project designed to serve US foreign policy.

bertan2• 10 years ago

Another thing is Turkey is %90+ muslim so It is very odd that people call Erdogan islamist. So what? It is a muslim country.

You think like this but of those %90+ people, half of them don't vote for Erdogan and most of them still call him "islamist".

So, no, it is not OK to think that Islam is the same for you and me and people in IS (Deaş). That is what a secular government solves. You don't discuss things with religion interpretations, you discuss over actual facts.

ozgune• 10 years ago

Just a few thoughts from another Turkish citizen.

The people that got arrested last night were allegedly (not actively) tied to a terrorist organization. The legal process is just starting, and these people didn't have their day in court. We didn't even hear what evidence the prosecutor is bringing forward.

You can try these MPs without arresting them. I'm not a lawyer and can't speak to the condition under which these people were arrested.

That said, the Turkish judiciary arrested hundreds of people as part of Ergenekon and Balyoz trials, kept them in jail for years and years, and then pardoned them. And we all just watched.

mustafaucar876• 10 years ago

Everyone in Turkey knows that who/what that party is associated to and supports. They run under PKK executives' commands and that is nowhere near ok and cannot be justifiable by saying they are elected. They knew what they were doing was illegal and kept doing it and now these are the consequences.

jree2• 10 years ago

Don't expect American's to understand anything in your post. Just like the delusions of Wall Street with the housing mess, the tech sector is in deep denial about what their social networks do. Luckily the rest of the world is slowly but surely reacting.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-facebook-idUSKBN12...

gkya2• 10 years ago

A must watch: 3 rules for rulers from CGP Grey on YouTube. 20 mins, talks about how authoritarian regimes function. Sheds light on why all these stuff happens the world over.

Turkey blocks social media again to stall protests, here’s how to access them

Related Stories