Twitter users from Turkey were blocked from accessing the microblogging website early on Friday, March 21, hours after Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had threatened to shut it down.
The cause for the shutdown is the failure of Twitter to remove wiretapped recordings leaked in the social media network which allegedly damaged the reputation of the Turkish government.
Turk visitors of the website were redirected into a page showing a message from Turkey’s telecommunications authority which explained the site’s closure, citing court orders.
However, things seem to go the other way around to the Prime Minister for as soon as the shutdown spread, netizens gathered up and showed their disapproval as hashtags like #TwitterIsBlockedInTurkey and #TurkeyBlocksTwitter trended on top worldwide.
Twitter, on the other hand, had said that they are ”looking into this now” and had also sent messages informing that blocked users can still tweet by using short message service, or SMS. Furthermore, blocked users had also found their own ways as proven by the increase in the usage of Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) in the country.
Audio recordings were leaked in the website prior to the local elections in Istanbul, Turkey happening on March 30, and are said to be conversations between the Prime Minister and his son talking about hiding large amounts of money.
