Twitter has become a scary place for Turks who critique Erdogan

Previously, fashion designer Barbaros Sansal was briefly jailed for “inciting hatred” after tweeting a video. Social media screenshots are routinely used as “evidence” in lawsuits against Kurdish journalists, such as Ali Baris Kurt, who was sentenced recently to 28 months in prison.

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Twitter has become a scary place for Turkish users, landing many who disagree with the current government straight in jail. Although frequent bans by the Erdogan government have failed to keep residents off the platform, the intimidation is getting more serious.

Since the coup attempt one year ago, which was blamed on one-time Erdogan ally, cleric Fetullah Gülen, Turkish police have started encouraging internet users to inform on others. In December 2016, Aksam, a newspaper owned by Ethem Sancak, a functionary in Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP), announced hotline apps and accounts launched by the police.

The app urged users to “Click the link to report a Twitter user to the police now”“. Since then, thousands of Twitter users critical of the government have been reported to the police’s @EmniyetGM Twitter account.

According to the independent news website Diken, as of July 2017 seven people, a day is taken into custody GetOldTweets software returned more than 3,500 tweets reporting a user to the police.

Screenshot of the police call

While the Turkish government has previously tried to censor tweets through court orders, calling for denunciation by citizens is new and chilling.

Censorship of traditional media

It’s difficult to imagine these days that Twitter was once a thriving place for free expression in Turkey. For many Turkish speakers, Twitter is a "grey market” news source, able to fill in the blanks left by mainstream media.

‘General directorate of security warns citizens 'You may report social media profiles and pages supporting terrorist activities along with their links and screenshots to the e-mail addresses below.’ Directorate General of Press and Information Turkish Government, Author provided

Around 6.5 million Turks are estimated to use Twitter, according to 2015 data. Though this number pales in comparison to 46 million Turkish Facebook users, Twitter has proved its worth repeatedly as a news source and political communication tool.

Twitter’s rise started after the 2010 constitutional referendum when Erdogan’s AKP, together with then-allies Gülenists, eliminated its secular rivals in the civil-military bureaucracy. By the following year, Erdogan was instructing mainstream media bosses on how to cover “news on terror”, his term for clashes between the Turkish army and Kurdish guerrillas.

In December 2011, the Turkish air force killed 34 Kurdish civilians near the Iraqi border. But the news was not covered by mainstream media until the next day when the Turkish general staff claimed responsibility for the airstrike.

A voice for the silenced ones

Soon, other silenced groups, such as leftists, environmentalists, and even Kemalists started to use Twitter. In June 2013, Turkish Twitter made a giant leap with the Gezi Protests, which began as an environmentalist action in Istanbul and turned into a millions-strong movement.

The June 2013 Taksim Gezi Park protests were boosted by the use of Twitter and other social networks.

To counter anti-government tweets, he hired thousands of pro-AKP Twitter users, but to no avail. Erdogan’s base was still most present on Facebook, while Twitter attracted young, urban, secular users (in part because its platform was not available in the Turkish language until 2011).

Twitter as Erdogan’s enemy

Turkey tries to turn off Twitter, after François-Léon Benouville, 2014.

Pressure increased again following the 2016 coup attempt. Since Erdogan became president in 2014 after 11 years as prime minister, Article 299 of the Turkish Penal Code has often been used to stifle dissent. After the attempted coup, this statute, which forbids insulting the president, has been coupled with terror charges. The result is often a serious prison sentence.

They continue to amplify hashtag campaigns in support of the government and contribute to the complaints against individual Twitter users. Their presence, combined with the AKP’s zealous chase of online opponents for “terrorism” punishment, has made Turkish Twitter a truly dangerous place.

On the Internet, the saying goes, nobody knows you are a dog. But in today’s Turkey, where journalists, lawyers, human rights defenders and academics can be declared terrorists arbitrarily, you may still find yourself chained.