Internet in Turkey

The Internet in Turkey has been available to the public since 1993, although experimentation at Ege University started in 1987. The first available connections were dial-up. Cable Internet has been available since 1998 and ADSL since 2001.

Currently Türk Telekom's TTNET ADSL2+ service is the most widely used Internet service in Turkey, offering speeds from 8 Mbit/s to 24 Mbit/s. TTNET offers VDSL2 service with speeds at 25 Mbit/s to 100 Mbit/s as well.[1] Alternative broadband companies, while mostly still using TTNET infrastructure, such as SmileADSL and Biri are also available. Superonline is offering fibre broadband in limited areas in 12 cities, though the company is enlarging at a healthy pace. They currently offer up to 1000 Mbit/s speeds. Furthermore, relatively wide but not universal coverage of cable Internet is maintained by UyduNET, offering speeds from 10 Mbit/s to 100 Mbit/s.

In March 2012, TTNet and Superonline, which between themselves provide the bulk of Turkish broadband Internet access, have started applying "fair use" policies (known with the Turkish abbreviations AKK for "Adil Kullanım Kotası" and AKN for "Adil Kullanım Noktası") that are overly restrictive in terms of the allowed download and upload quotas. Most accounts are allotted 50 GB download (and 10 GB upload) quotas, after which the bandwidth is reduced 10-fold, down to 3 Mbit/s. Some users have reported that their broadband speeds were reduced in six days into the month. Both companies have been under heavy criticism for their "fair use" policies.

TTNET's monopoly and perceived excessive pricing have received numerous criticisms from users over the years.

According to TÜSİAD, Turkey has 36 million active Internet users with 10 million active e-commerce users.[2] The penetration and the usage of credit cards are very high in Turkey. However development of alternative payment systems will be helpful both by facilitating the shopping of the consumers owning credit cards and by familiarizing non-credit card holders with the e-commerce.

Turkey implements protectionist policies to stimulate the local internet technology industry and enforce data retention: In 2016 payment gateway PayPal was forced to cease most of its operations in the country.[3] In January 2017 the government unveiled plans to build a domestic web search engine and webmail service.[4]

Internet Entrepreneurship in Turkey, also called "Digital Bosphorus"[5] has reached several exits in last years. The biggest three of them have been Yemeksepeti,[6] Gittigidiyor[7] and Markafoni.[8] According to Sina Afra, the potential of the Turkish Internet market is bigger than in many other European countries.[9]

Internet in Turkey holds a 'Not Free' ranking in Freedom House's index.[10] Turkish government has constantly blocked websites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and as of May 2017, Wikipedia is currently inaccessible.[11] According to Twitter's transparency report, Turkey leads in social media censorship.[12]

See also

References

  1. ↑ http://www.ttnet.com.tr/web/234-1196-1-1/tur/evde_ttnet/baglanti_cesitleri_-_vdsl2/kisaca Archived January 30, 2011, at the Wayback Machine.
  2. ↑ "Turkish Internet Report". TÜSİAD. Retrieved 9 October 2016.
  3. ↑ "Startups face new uncertainties as PayPal announces Turkey withdrawal - D8 News". D8 News. 2016-05-31. Retrieved 2017-01-11.
  4. ↑ "Turkey to launch domestic Google, Gmail replacements aligned with local culture and values". Turkey Blocks. 2017-01-06. Retrieved 2017-01-11.
  5. ↑ "Digital Bosphorus". Sina Afra. Retrieved 8 October 2016.
  6. ↑ "Yemeksepeti sold". Milliyet. Retrieved 9 October 2016.
  7. ↑ "Gittigidiyor sold to eBay". Techcrunch. Retrieved 9 October 2016.
  8. ↑ "Markafoni acquired by Naspers". Techcrunch. Retrieved 9 October 2016.
  9. ↑ "Future of Turkish Internet". sinaafra.com. Retrieved 9 October 2016.
  10. ↑ "Freedom on the Net 2016". freedomhouse.org. Retrieved 1 May 2017.
  11. ↑ "Turkey Blocks: Incident Reports and News". turkeyblocks.org. Retrieved 1 May 2017.
  12. ↑ "Turkey leads in social media censorship: new Twitter transparency report". turkeyblocks.org. Retrieved 1 May 2017.
  • Salih Sarıkaya (17 October 2014). "Censorship of Internet in Turkey: What does it mean?". Archived from the original on 1 February 2016.
  • "eCommerce Report". TÜSİAD. Retrieved 9 October 2016.
  • "Turkish eCommerce Outlook". Deloitte. Retrieved 9 October 2016.
  • Sina Afra. "Observations on eCommerce". Sinaafra.com. Retrieved 9 October 2016.


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