Turkish government's fact-checking app brings concern, ridicule
Turkey’s information tsar Fahrettin Altun’s announcement of a “next-generation application” to combat “false facts” raised fears of further control over social media.
When the Turkish government announced May 20 that it would launch a next generation fact-checking platform to counter misinformation on social media, the first reaction from the government’s critics was ridicule.
“A great app — get a reply from the government so that you know for a fact that the opposite is true,” tweeted one user. Can Okar, a widely followed Turkish user based in Switzerland, tweeted an imaginary scenario: "An inquiry such as 'Let me check the president’s statement that Turkey has $95 billion reserves [while] all the economists say they’re gone' would yield the reply, '[The app] says those economists are terrorists and so are you for even asking.'”
