The Turkish parliament on Wednesday handed the most recent nationwide ban on social media for kids, becoming a member of a development that started with Australia’s landmark ban in December 2025.
Turkey banned social media for kids underneath 15, requiring all platforms to implement strict age verification procedures. The legislation additionally covers on-line gaming platforms, which regularly have a social media aspect.
Along with burdening social media and gaming platforms with creating age verification methods, Turkey additionally requires them to elucidate the intricacies of the brand new legislation to their customers, create “user-friendly” instruments for parental management, and keep away from working “misleading adverts.”
On-line recreation corporations will likely be required to nominate “representatives” to Turkey to function compliance officers. Violations of the brand new legislation might be punished by fines and restrictions on Web bandwidth.
Turkey’s laws avoids phrases like “ban,” as a substitute framing the laws as an order for social media corporations to create “secure digital areas” for kids.
Critics had no drawback seeing an iron fist contained in the rhetorical velvet glove, mentioning that Turkey is among the world’s extra censorious governments and has lengthy expertise with social media crackdowns. Current examples embody the tight social media restrictions imposed final yr throughout protests by supporters of jailed Istanbul mayor and opposition chief Ekrem Imamoglu.
Many information shops identified the timing of Wednesday’s parliamentary vote one week after a college taking pictures wherein a 14-year-old boy murdered 9 college students and a instructor in southern Turkey.
Support Greater and Subscribe to view content
This is premium stuff. Subscribe to read the entire article.
