Turkey blocks instant messaging platform Discord

Turkish authorities said on Wednesday that Turkey had blocked access to the instant messaging platform Discord in accordance with a court decision after the platform refused to share information demanded by Ankara.

“We are aware of reports of Discord being unreachable in Russia and Turkey. Our team is investigating these reports at this time,” the San Francisco-based company said in a status update.

Turkey’s Information Technologies and Communication Authority published the decision on the access ban on its website.

Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said an Ankara court decided to block access to Discord from Turkey due to sufficient suspicion that crimes of “child sexual abuse and obscenity” had been committed by some using the platform.

The block comes after public outrage in Turkey caused by the murder of two women by a 19-year-old man in Istanbul this month. Content on social media showed Discord users subsequently praising the killing.

Transport and Infrastructure Minister Abdulkadir Uraloglu said the nature of the Discord platform made it difficult for authorities to monitor and intervene when illegal or criminal content is shared.

“Security personnel cannot go through the content. We can only intervene when users complain to us about content shared there,” he told parliament reporters.

“Since Discord refuses to share its own information, including IP addresses and content, with our security units, we were forced to block access.”

On Tuesday, the TASS news agency reported that Russia’s communications regulator blocked Discord for violating Russian law after previously fining the company for failing to remove banned content.