Facing intense scrutiny over the presence of bad accounts and troll armies on its platform globally including in Turkey, Twitter is planning to establish a legal entity in Turkey to continue operating under the country’s controversial internet law that took effect last year, the company announced late Friday.
Under the law, social media companies that have more than 1 million users must store Turkish users’ data in the country. Human rights and media freedom groups say the law amounts to censorship and violates the rights to privacy and access to information.
According to the Freedom of Expression Association, as of October 2020, more than 450,000 domains, 120,000 links and 42,000 tweets were blocked in Turkey.
Twitter has also demanded Turkish social media companies to designate an official representative in Turkey, who must answer requests to take down content that violates privacy within 48 hours.
If the companies refuse to comply, they could face fines, advertising bans, and eventually bandwidth reductions that could make the platforms unusable.
The Turkish government says Internet Law 5651, as the legislation is called, is necessary to protect the rights of social media users in the country and to fight online criminal activity. But human rights organizations caution the law is censorship that risks access to information, in a country that has a history of restricting free speech.
Twitter said, in reference to Turkey, that the company is "committed to protecting and defending the Open Internet, and as part of this work, have called for the establishment of regional and global standards for online services".
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