Turkey imposed fines on social media giants for violating new Internet laws

Turkish Government has imposed fines on major social media giants. It fined Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Periscope, YouTube, and TikTok more than $1.1 million for not abiding by the Turkish Internet Regulations. The amount is about 10 million lira in Turkish currency. Turkey does not want to create any black patch on its and social media giants’ relations. They want them to consider their rules strict and irrevocable.

Sayan, Turkey’s deputy transport and infrastructure minister tweeted, “Foreign companies operating in Turkey that reach more than one million people daily have been told about some of the rules they need to comply with.” The law that came into effect last month said a few factors. The platforms having more than 1 million Turkish users should remove ‘offensive’ contents within 48 hours and should store user data inside Turkey.

Critics commented that the law would prohibit people who are active in social media from dissension post-regulation. The fines will represent the elevating rate of penalties that can end 90% of the site’s internet traffic bandwidth. Omar Fatih Sayan is the chairman of the Information and Communication Technology Authority. He said on Twitter that they would fine all the listed social media giants on Wednesday.

Sayan also tweeted that they can extend the measures with an inclusion of a 30 million lira fine, a ban on the advertisement, and a 50% bandwidth cut within 5 months. The amount values about $3.5 million dollars. Also, he said that those companies not following the rules would face consequences. They would bear the liability to have their bandwidth cut by 90% or block access. When the companies abide by the laws, they will lift the restrictions. And also, they will collect only the 1/4^th of the imposed fine.

Sayan tweeted, “Our aim is not to be in conflict with these social media giants serving billions of people around the world”. People on Twitter insulted Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s daughter and son-in-law for having their 4^th child. They passed legislation for social media to clean up.