The Bill of 40-article on the Amendment of the Press Law and Certain Laws was submitted to the Turkish Grand National Assembly on 26.05.2022. With this bill, spreading misleading information to the public is defined as an offense, and restrictions are imposed on social media and communication applications.
The first articles of the bill include the regulations regarding internet news sites and press cards, like other periodicals, within the scope of the Press Law. In addition, employees of news sites will be able to benefit from the press card and receive official announcements from the Press Advertising Agency.
Internet news sites will be obliged to keep obligatory information such as the workplace address, trade name, e-mail address, electronic notification address, contact information and the name of the hosting provider in their own internet environment in a way that users can directly access from the home page and under the communication heading. In addition, it will be mandatory to indicate the date when a content is first offered on the internet, in a way that does not change each time it is accessed.
With the addition of internet news sites within the scope of periodicals, they will have to submit declarations regarding their fields of activity, and it is envisaged that the declarations will be submitted to the Press Advertisement Institution instead of the Public Prosecutor’s Office in order to reduce the workload of the judiciary. A news site that does not fulfill its declaration obligation and corrects false information within two weeks will not be able to acquire the right to broadcast periodicals.
Internet news sites will have to protect the content they publish within the scope of delivery and preservation obligation for two years in order to deliver them to the Public Prosecution Office in an accurate and complete manner.
Internet news sites will have to publish the correction and reply letter of the injured person, in the same fonts and in the same way, within one day at the latest. In cases where the content is unpublished and access is blocked, the correction and reply letter will be published for one week.
Those who can apply for a press card are listed below;
- Turkish citizen media members of media organizations operating in Turkey,
- Owners of periodicals or representatives of legal entities and chairman of the board of directors of radio and television,
- Foreign media members who act on behalf of media organizations and whose mandate covers Turkey, and foreign media members whose mandate does not cover Turkey, but who come to Turkey temporarily for news purposes,
- Turkish citizen owners and employees of media outlets broadcasting abroad,
- Turkish citizen media members doing freelance journalism abroad,
- Public personnel working in public institutions and organizations serving in the field of media and information services provided by public institutions and organizations,
- Provided that they operate in the field of media, unions and managers of associations and foundations determined by the President’s decision to operate in the public interest.
Press card applications will be made to the Republic of Türkiye Directorate of Communication.
Penalty for a willful offense of five years or more or for blackmail, theft, breach of trust, perjury, slander, bribery, smuggling, bid rigging and other disgraceful offenses and crimes against the constitutional order and those Press cards will not be issued to those convicted of crimes against the functioning of order, crimes against national defense, crimes against state secrets and espionage. In addition, it is foreseen that if the press card holder engages in activities and behaviors contrary to the moral principles of the press, the press cards will be canceled by the decision of the Commission.
With the regulation brought by the 29th article of the bill, the crime of spreading misleading information to the public was added to the Turkish Penal Code, and those who broadcast with the aim of creating anxiety, fear or panic among the public, disrupting the internal and external security of the country, public order and public peace, are imprisoned from one year to three years. In addition, the penalty will be increased by half if the perpetrator hides his true identity or is committed within the framework of an organization’s activity.
The scope of the obligations imposed on social network providers by the bill is expanded:
- The Turkish representative of social network providers must be a Turkish citizen resident in Turkey.
- The reports submitted by the social network providers to the Agency will also include information on their algorithms, advertising policies and transparency policies regarding title tags, featured or reduced access content.
- The social network provider will take the necessary measures to provide users with the option to update their preferences for the content it offers and to limit the use of their personal data, and will include these measures in its report.
- The social network provider will be obliged to provide a clear, understandable and easily accessible place on its website, which parameters it uses when offering suggestions to users.
- The social network provider will create an ad library containing information such as content, advertiser, ad duration, target audience, number of people or groups reached, and publish it on the website, and will include this in its report.
- Social network providers will be obliged to take the necessary measures to provide children-specific segregated services and will take the necessary measures to prevent children from accessing illegal and harmful content.
The Bill is available here.