The Freedom of Expression Association (İFÖD) announced on Feb. 11 that 126 accounts on X were blocked following an order from the President of the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK) at the request of the police department.
According to İFÖD, the Ankara 4th Criminal Judgeship of Peace approved the access restriction in a single ruling on Feb. 5. The court’s decision, reportedly based on “protecting national security and public order,” led to the censorship of multiple news outlets and journalists.
Notable accounts affected by the ban include the independent news platform Artı Gerçek, its columnist Hayko Bağdat, Mezopotamya News Agency (MA), Jin News, Yeni Yaşam newspaper, and freelance journalist Metin Cihan.
Interestingly, some of the blocked accounts had been inactive since 2015 and were previously restricted between 2016 and 2017 under Twitter’s original domain (twitter.com). However, at that time, Twitter’s management did not remove or conceal these accounts. The latest ruling, however, resulted in X making these accounts invisible to users in Turkey.
This move has sparked renewed debate on digital censorship, press freedom, and the increasing role of platform compliance with government orders.
duvarenglish.com