Tor, one of the biggest anonymity networks, has been banned in Turkey. The administration of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced the latest measure as part of his massive campaign of censorship.
This time they are not taking journalists to jail, this time the new target of such campaign is the biggest anonymity web “the onion router,” best known as Tor.
Tor is a network which the main function is enabling anonymous communication, making it tough, if not impossible for anyone who wants to track your movements down, to see the webmail, search history, social media posts or other online activity.
This software is free to download from the Internet, so it’s accessible for anyone who wants to keep surf the net privately, and that is precisely what the Turkish government does not like about Tor.
Erdoğan’s administration already blocked VPNs
It is also important to mention the ban that already exists on virtual private networks, best known as VPN.
All these measures highlight how important is for the Turkish government to restrict any trace of privacy that internet users may want to have in the Euro-Asian country.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s administration launched this censorship campaign after the failed coup that took place earlier this year. The government wants to control the flow of information whether is the press or social media.
What is the objective of these Internet regulations?
According to Turkey Blocks, these “sophisticated blocking measures” are going to stop internet users from easily avoiding social media shutdowns and other mass-censorship tactics in Turkey.
Along with the ban on VPN services, all these stringent measures could make Turkey’s digital world resemble China’s regulations. The latter are known to be widely commented and criticized all over the world as too restrictive.
All these actions taken by the government of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan have proven to bring along many consequences, like the coup attempted some months ago. This particular prohibition seems to be a preventive measure from the government.
#Tor network blocked in Turkey as government cracks down on #VPN use: technical reporthttps://t.co/2NSqlXnoJn pic.twitter.com/A8mb0RsZT9
— Turkey Blocks (@TurkeyBlocks) December 18, 2016
The future looks grim for Turkish Internet users
It is important to state the already existent block of web pages and apps such as Facebook, Twitter, Whatsapp, and Youtube. Also, access to sharing services like Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, and GitHub has been restricted.
The Turkey Blocks said the new network restrictions imposed by the officials would affect many Internet users. It is going to be difficult for people to find a way around this new mass-censorship.
They closed saying these measures were going to change how people surfed the web in the coming years resulting in less freedom for the media and public opinion in the country.
Source: Digital Trends
