Facebook rebuffs Turkey’s controversial social media law
Facebook told Turkish civil society members it would not comply with Ankara’s new social media law over concerns it would limit free speech rights, setting the stage for possible fines and access blocks on the platform as other social media companies consider their options.
ISTANBUL — Turkish internet rights activist Yaman Akdeniz got a call from Facebook’s London office Monday in which the company’s human rights team said it would not comply with a controversial social media law passed in Ankara this summer.
The bill requires social media companies with more than 1 million daily users in Turkey to appoint representatives in the country, store user data locally and comply with state content removal requests, among other measures, by Oct. 1 or face steep fines and domestic access blocks on their platforms.
Akdeniz, who had campaigned for social media companies to reject the state’s attempt to gain greater control over the platforms’ operations, said he was “surprised” by Facebook’s decision, which includes Instagram as a subsidiary of the company.
“There were no negotiations,” Akdeniz, a law professor at Istanbul Bilgi University and a founder of the Freedom of Expression Association (IFOD), told Al-Monitor. “They basically decided they are not going to appoint a legal representative in Turkey.”
