The Turkish government has recently passed the new regulations on the legislation concerning social media platforms and online services. The amendment to the Law on the Regulation of Broadcasts via Internet and Prevention of Crimes Committed through Such Broadcasts No. 5651 (“Law”), which has been published in the Official Gazette numbered 31202 on 30.07.2020. Bearing the specific enforcement dates for some terms, many obligations for Social Network Providers shall be enforced as from 01.10.2020. There are many significant new liabilities on social media platforms and online services with over one million daily users to provide extended control over platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

1. Social Network Provider

The definition of the Social Network Provider has been added to the Law as "natural persons or legal entities who enable users to create, view or share contents such as texts, images, recordings, location via the internet for purpose of social interaction shall be a social network provider". It is understood that as many contributors in the social media shall fall into the definition of Social Network Provider, each company should seek their own obligations under the new terms. We are of the opinion that the government is an attempt to control the public contents, which is why it is more likely to apply relevant sanctions to social media companies. The Social Network Providers that fail to comply face steep fines, bandwidth reduction, and advertising bans. Platforms must also store user data in Turkey, which critics worry could expose the data to Turkish authorities and the judiciary.

2. Obligations of Social Network Providers

a. Appointing a Representative
The foreign-based Social Network Providers which have more than one million daily access from Turkey are obligated to appoint at least one representative in Turkey. Social Media Provider must openly publish the contact information of the representative on its website in order to fulfill the requirements of notifications or requests to be sent by the Information and Communication Technologies Authority of Turkey (“Authority”) and any other judicial or administrative authorities and to respond to the applications made by individuals under the Law. Contact details of the representative must be declared to the Authority. In the circumstance where a representative is a natural person, he or she must be a Turkish citizen.

The representative must be authorized to take actions and respond to requests and notifications received from the individuals, the Authority, the Union of Access Providers, and to ensure fulfillment of other obligations stipulated under the Law.

The Social Network Provider, who does not fulfill the obligation to appoint and notify the representative stipulated above shall be sentenced following sanctions respectively;
First Fine: In the event that the obligation is not fulfilled within thirty days after the notification of the Authority, the Social Network Provider is fined TRY 10,000,000 (ten million Turkish Lira) by the Authority.
Second fine: Then, an additional administrative fine of TRY 30,000,000 (thirty million Turkish Lira) will be imposed, if the obligation is not fulfilled within thirty days as of the notification of the first administrative fine.
Third fine: In case of failure to fulfill this obligation after the notification of the second administrative fine, the natural and legal persons who taxpayers resident in Turkey are prohibited from giving an advertisement to and/or entering into the commercial agreement with such Social Network Provider including transferring money to the Social Network Provider in any circumstance.
Fifth sanction: After three months from the date of the advertisement ban, the Authority may apply to the criminal court of peace to reduce the internet traffic bandwidth of the social network provider by fifty percent.
Sixth sanction: If the said obligation is not fulfilled within thirty days from the implementation of the judge's decision regarding the acceptance of the application, the Authority may apply to the criminal court of peace to reduce the internet traffic bandwidth of the social network provider up to ninety percent.
The president of the Authority is authorized to appeal against the decision of the criminal court of peace. The access providers shall be obligated to meet the requirements of the said decision within four hours. In the circumstance where the representative is appointed and notified to the Authority after the sanctions, one-fourth of the administrative fines is collected, the advertising ban is canceled and the court decisions become null.