Access to Instagram was reopened in Turkey Saturday night (August 10) following an eight day ban that had begun August 2.
Minister of Transport and Infrastructure Abdulkadir Uraloğlu announced the lifting of the ban on social media Saturday evening.
Instagram ban
On the morning of August 2nd, Turkish authorities blocked access to the platform, citing failure to remove unlawful posts as justification for the ban.
Although not explicitly stated, censoring of posts related to the recent assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran was strongly implied as the impetus for the ban.
A social media post dated July 31st from President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s communications director Fahrettin Altun criticized the platform’s removal of posts related to the assassination, saying Instagram had “prevented people from expressing their condolences on the martyrdom of Haniye without giving us any reason.”
In a speech at a party meeting on August 5th, President Erdoğan addressed the ban publicly, saying that access to the platform would be reopened once officials from Meta, Instagram’s parent company, complied with demands from the Turkish government.
Following the ban on Instagram, access to the popular gaming platform Robolex was also blocked on August 8th.
Access restored
Announcing the end of the ban, Uraoğlu wrote:
Medyascope'u destekle. Medyascope'a abone ol.
Medyascope’u senin desteğin ayakta tutuyor. Hiçbir patronun, siyasi çıkarın güdümünde değiliz; hangi haberi yapacağımıza biz karar veriyoruz. Tıklanma uğruna değil, kamu yararına çalışıyoruz. Bağımsız gazeteciliğin sürmesi, sitenin açık kalması ve herkesin doğru bilgiye erişebilmesi senin desteğinle mümkün.
“From the beginning, we have demanded that social media platforms respect Turkish law. Following our meetings with Instagram authorities, they have agreed to meet our demands and work with us regarding the censorship they have imposed on users.”
Content creators, e-commerce users report difficulties amidst ban
In Turkish-language reporting from last week, Medyascope correspondent Edanur Tanış spoke to Instagram users who earn their living through content creation on the platform and described the difficulty of the ban.
One user who spoke to Tanış described the difficulty in earning a living from social media content amidst the Instagram ban:
“We are not all wealthy influencers. Many of us are simply trying to pay our childrens’ school fees using the money we earn on these platforms…We’ve become unemployed overnight. Since the ban started I’ve been unable to earn any money. And I’m worried about logging on using a VPN because I’m concerned they might start giving out fines for this.”
By Leo Kendrick
