Meta announced it had been hit with a "substantial" fine for refusing to comply with Turkish government demands to restrict content on Facebook and Instagram.
Turkish government tried to suspend social media accounts sharing information on the widespread protests following the arrest of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s main political rival, Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu.
"We pushed back on requests from the Turkish government to restrict content that is clearly in the public interest, and have been fined by them as a consequence," Meta spokesperson said, declining to identify the scale of the fine.
"Government requests to restrict speech online alongside threats to shut down online services are severe and have a chilling effect on people’s ability to express themselves," Meta added in statement.
In 2024 Meta received 5,677 requests from Turkish authorities to remove content, 4,199 of which came from Türkiye's communications authority, Meta's transparency report said.
Meta heeded 40 percent of the requests, the report said.
The rights groups and journalists’ organisations also call on the Turkish government to cease pressuring online platforms to block content.
"Rather than simply accepting such blocking orders, we urge platforms to take all steps possible to limit their scope and duration, including by challenging their legality in court. Platforms should also be transparent towards affected users and the broader public about government requests for censorship and measures taken in response; and take all possible steps to maintain platform access in the event of shutdowns or throttling,"- their statement reads.
Plarform X issued a statement according to which it objected to ‘multiple court orders [...] to block over 700 accounts’, including those of news organisations, journalists, and political figures. On 26 March, X announced that they filed an individual application before the Constitutional Court challenging an order by Türkiye's Information Technologies Authority to block 126 accounts.
Wall Street ended sharply lower on Tuesday as investors worried about AI creating more competition for software makers, keeping them on edge ahead of ...
Small Cirrus SR 20 crashed in Littleborough, Rochdale, after taking off from Birmingham Airport...
President Donald Trump on Tuesday (February 3) said the U.S. is negotiating with Iran "right now," after Tehran demanded that planned talks be held in...
A second group of Palestinian medical evacuees arrived in Egypt from Gaza via the Rafah border crossing on Tuesday (February 3), the second day since ...
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Tuesday that Kyiv is waiting for a response from the United States after overnight Russian attacks dam...
The S&P 500 edged to a record closing high on Tuesday, marking its fifth consecutive day of gains, as strong advances in technology stocks offset a sharp selloff in healthcare shares and a mixed batch of corporate earnings.
TikTok has reached a confidential settlement in a landmark lawsuit over youth mental health, leaving Meta and YouTube to face a jury in California as the first major trial of its kind gets underway.
The year 2025 marked a global first in social media regulation, as Australia enacted the world’s first blanket ban on social media usage for children under 16 years old.
Australia will become the first country to ban social media accounts for users under 16 starting 10 December, with regulators tracking “migratory patterns” to stop teens shifting to other platforms, Communications Minister Anika Wells said on Wednesday (3 December).
Heavy snow continued to batter northern and western Japan on Saturday (31 January) leaving cities buried under record levels of snowfall and prompting warnings from authorities. Aomori city in northern Japan recorded 167 centimetres of snow by Friday - the highest January total since 1945.
The United States accused Cuba of interfering with the work of its top diplomat in Havana on Sunday (1 February) after small groups of Cubans jeered at him during meetings with residents and church representatives.
Talks with the U.S. should be pursued to secure national interests as long as "threats and unreasonable expectations" are avoided, President Masoud Pezeshkian posted on X on Tuesday (3 February).
Early voting for Thailand’s parliamentary elections began on Sunday (1 February), with more than two million eligible voters casting ballots nationwide ahead of the 8 February general election, as authorities acknowledged errors and irregularities at some polling stations.
At least 12 people were killed and seven wounded after a Russian drone struck a bus carrying miners in Ukraine's southeastern Dnipropetrovsk region, government officials said on Sunday (1 February).
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer spoke to U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday and discussed the situation in Ukraine, including the overnight Russian attacks on the country, the UK government said.
U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday (3 February) signed a spending deal into law that ends a partial U.S. government shutdown and gives lawmakers time to negotiate potential limits on his immigration crackdown.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio met on Tuesday (February 3) with Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar one day after the U.S. and India signed a trade deal that slashes U.S. tariffs on Indian goods.
Small Cirrus SR 20 crashed in Littleborough, Rochdale, after taking off from Birmingham Airport
President Donald Trump on Tuesday (February 3) said the U.S. is negotiating with Iran "right now," after Tehran demanded that planned talks be held in Oman not Türkiye, and that the scope be narrowed.
You can download the AnewZ application from Play Store and the App Store.
What is your opinion on this topic?
Leave the first comment