Turkey’s Communications Directorate has announced the blocking of nearly 400 social media accounts it claims are linked to the faith-based Gülen movement, in the latest episode of growing online censorship in the country, Turkish Minute reported.
Burhanettin Duran, head of the Communications Directorate, said in a post on X that 379 accounts with links to the movement had been detected through what he described as “comprehensive digital monitoring and analysis.”
He claimed the accounts were spreading terrorist propaganda and producing systematic disinformation.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement, inspired by the late Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, since corruption investigations in December 2013 implicated him as well as some members of his family and inner circle.
Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and a conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan began to target the movement’s members. He designated the movement as a terrorist organization in May 2016 and intensified the crackdown on it following an abortive putsch in July of the same year that he accused Gülen of masterminding. The movement strongly denies involvement in the coup attempt or any terrorist activity.
Duran said access restrictions and legal measures were swiftly imposed in coordination with relevant institutions as he described the operation part of Turkey’s broader fight against threats to national security.
“No terrorist organization, its affiliates or disinformation operations will ever be tolerated, including in the online sphere,” Duran said.
He did not provide details on which accounts were affected.
The latest access ban comes amid growing concerns over online censorship in Turkey, where activists, journalists — including those in exile — and opposition politicians have increasingly faced account restrictions or bans at the government’s request.
The government has increasingly relied on sweeping counterterrorism legislation and broad internet powers to restrict online speech, block content and prosecute critics, drawing repeated condemnation from press freedom and digital rights groups.
Turkey has already introduced wide-ranging internet regulations over the past decade, granting authorities broad powers to demand content removals, restrict access and require social media companies to appoint legal representatives in the country.
Press freedom advocates, however, have long warned that such measures are often used not only to address crime or protect minors but also to tighten government control over online speech.
Social media remains one of the few spaces where opposition voices can still reach large audiences in the country, in which 90 percent of the media is controlled by the government, according to Reporters without Borders (RSF).
International watchdogs have ranked Turkey among the world’s most repressive environments for online expression, citing vague laws that enable arbitrary content bans and heavy pressure on foreign platforms to comply with government takedown orders.
Turkey was ranked the lowest-scoring country in Europe for online freedoms, according to a 2025 report from the Washington-based Freedom House.
The group gave Turkey a score of 31 out of 100 and classified the country as “not free.”
