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Turkey Has Reportedly Banned Google

oxide7 and a number of other readers sent word (from mostly non-authoritative sources as yet) that Turkey had imposed an indefinite ban on some Google properties. "Turkey's Telecommunications Presidency said it has banned access to many of Google IP addresses without assigning clear reasons. The statement did not confirm if the ban is temporary or permanent. Google's translation and document sharing sites have also been banned indefinitely along with YouTube and Facebook in the country. Other services such as AppEngine, FeedBurner, Analytics, etc., have also been reportedly banned." Some real-time commentary (much of it in Turkish) can be found at Twitter hashtag #TurkeyCensoringGoogle. We have noted in past years the censorious ways of Turkish courts.

9 of 531 comments (clear)

  1. Flow of Information by headkase · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think this quote applies here:

    As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.

    Commissioner Pravin Lal
    "U.N. Declaration of Rights"

    source

    --
    Shh.
    1. Re:Flow of Information by Cassius+Corodes · · Score: 5, Interesting

      It is indeed to do with the AKP party - but that is nothing new for turkey - what is new that this time the army has not responded with a coup as it normally does when religious folk get out of control in turkey. I think it has happened at least 3 or 4 times so far. Since their election turkey has moved closer to Iran, and with the blockade stunt now has taken leadership of the 'resistance bloc' (as well as caused their religious followers to go totally bat shit crazy on the streets (see some of the photos)). Basically barring the army doing anything turkey has left both the western and secular realm.

      This situation is quite interesting as the majority has repeatedly elected, what is basically, an Islamist party into power. The west has made it clear they dont want the army to intervene this time, but that is the only thing that can save Turkey from the Islamists. What the hell are you supposed to do if you believe in democracy but democracy spawns people who bring it down?

      --
      Control is an illusion, order our comforting lie. From chaos, through chaos, into chaos we fly
    2. Re:Flow of Information by Bartab · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yet, Turkey is/was a charter nation in the creation of the United Nations; they've also been a member in NATO since the Cold War.

      The UN is populated more by dictatorships than anything approaching "free countries", and NATO broke down into a "sign this paper against communism and the US will give you money" almost instantly.

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.
    3. Re:Flow of Information by macshit · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The -people- of Turkey want a religious, sharia law based, dictatorship. It's a foreign thought to western minds, but as you point out they've pressured for such a gov't several times. At which point the, highly secular, military comes out in a minor coup and re-establishes what was the second freest nation in the area.

      No, some people in Turkey want a religious government, some would like sharia law, and a few would like a dictatorship. The number of people that actually want all those things together is probably rather small.

      --
      We live, as we dream -- alone....
  2. Oh yes they did. by unity100 · · Score: 5, Informative

    'Telecommunications and Communication Ministry' has placed a ban on various ips of google, ranging from google analytics to youtube.

    despite the cause on the surface is shown deragotary videos of kemal ataturk on youtube, nothing could justify banning analytics ips. so, in the end one of the ministers slipped the real reason - google doesnt pay tax to turkey.

    there is no reason why it should either. google is a corp that is centered in america, and according to treaty to prevent double taxation, it should not pay tax here, since it pays tax in usa. so there is no legal justification for trying to tax them.

    but then again, you cant expect reasoning, or, abiding by laws, from an islamist government.

  3. Re:Seriously by Darkness404 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    NATO doesn't care about dictators, look at how many right-wing military coups we've supported. Heck, look at how most of NATO supported just about everyone who was anti-Soviet. They don't care about human rights, just as long as they aren't communist or allied with Russia.

    All NATO stands for is opposing Russia and its allies, if you think it stands for human rights or anything you should look at the conflicts in the cold war and which side the US supported.

    --
    Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
  4. As Someone from Turkey there is more to it by stikves · · Score: 5, Informative

    Unfortunately this kind of thing happens all the time, and the government cannot do anything about it. Even the president has criticized the ban last week, but it's all up to the courts.

    According to Turkish law, *any* PA can ask for a preliminary injunction to ban *any* web site. The web site has to comply within a month, otherwise TK (which is the telecomunnication authority) will have to block the web site in question. Nobody (including prime minister, or the president) cannot stop the ban (unless the website complies).

    So if a person from a small town complains about a web site (for example Youtube, or Blogger), and the PA for that town finds the case worthy, he/she request a court order for the ban. This has actually happened (Blogger was banned since some bloggers published world cup matches, and the local TV stations which bought WC rights have complained).

    The Google ban comes from Youtube ban. Previously they only removed youtube.com from DNS servers, but people have installed alternate DNS servers, and all was fine. Now they decided to block based on server IP, which is probably shared with other Google services as well.

    Anyways they are trying to amend the law, so that this kinds of bans will be restricted (not just any random PA in any random town), but the best would be abolishing the law altogether.

  5. Critical Thought. by headkase · · Score: 5, Informative

    Can I be blamed for others lack of critical thought? The quote begins:

    As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century...

    Anyone who is thinking as they read instead of blindly ploughing through the words would have realized that Earth has not reached it's final century yet?

    And it was fully sourced too.. ;)

    --
    Shh.
  6. Re:Or, put another way... by jmorris42 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    > I dunno, but it seems to me that dogmatic, xenophobic, recidivist behaviour is on the rise
    > worldwide -- Islam certainly has no corner on the market for running amok, not now, and not
    > historically, and the term "Christian" probably carries as much negative baggage through
    > the years as "Muslim" does.

    This quote is a good example of an all too common species of politically correct fool. So much wrong with it. It assumes time is immaterial. That events in the dark past are indisinguishable from current events and carry the exact same moral weight. That persons, events and movements must be judged with the exact same modern politically correct intolerant eye.

    We are still crawling up from the muck, people and events must be viewed from the perspective of the time they occured in. For example the US Founders lived in a time when slavery was accepted as normal and had been since recorded history began. Individual liberty of any sort was a REVOLUTIONARY idea. After exhausting peaceful means they became violent revolutionaries. And most of them understood the inherent conflict between slavery and "All Men are created equal..." but also realized the new nation wasn't ready to follow where that line of thought lead. But notice that less than a century later the only places still practicing slavery were parts of Africa and the Middle East outside the range of the British Navy. Christianity did some nasty things but went through the Enlightenment, pretending that didn't happen and judging it as if that didn't happen and that the religion of the Inquisition still exists unchanged is daft.

    Islam didn't experience the Enlightenment and rejects it today. The past is just that, past; we have a problem in the here and now as a result. Islam's rejection of the foundational principles of modern civilization is a problem NOW. Coexistance isn't even possible because of their expansionist and supremisist ideas. We in the West either abandon our civilization and accept Sharia or sooner or later (and with Nukes spreading it better be sooner) we are going to be forced to end Islam as it is currently known and practiced. That means Ann Coulter's solution of "Invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity." It will be the worst human rights atrocity in recorded history but I'm damned if I see a better solution. We just don't have the time left to embark on a psyops action to slowly pervert their religion so as to remove the nastier bits.

    So if it comes down to them or me I'm picking me and mine. Politically incorrect selfish bastard that I am. Future generations can flagelate themselves like the modern campus set do now about the American Indians, the Monroe Doctrine, ending WWII with the Bomb, the Cold War or any of that other stuff. So long as it IS civilization having that discussion in the future and not some starving primitives worshiping an insane child molester in a radioactive wasteland. And they will be sort of 'right' in that by the more advanced civilization our hard choices will allow them to build what we will do in our day will BE wrong... but still making the same mistake modern scholars keep making of judging us by their standards. So be it.

    --
    Democrat delenda est