Turkey: X must stop blocking journalists’ accounts
Access-blocking orders are increasingly being used in Türkiye as a tool to restrict freedom of expression and press freedom. In recent weeks, not only news websites but also the social media accounts of journalists, media organisations, professional associations and civil society organisations have been blocked from being accessed in Türkiye.
In response to these restrictions, the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the Turkish Journalists’ Union (TGS) are making the following clear and public call to X and its management:
X must not block access to the accounts of journalists and media organisations in Türkiye without a court order or an explicit, transparent and reviewable decision by an independent judicial authority. Moreover, at a time when serious concerns exist regarding the impartiality of judicial decisions in Türkiye, access restrictions imposed on the basis of such decisions raise further concerns about arbitrariness.
Recent developments demonstrate that this is not an issue limited to a handful of individual accounts. On 30 September 2026, access to both the T24 news website and its X account was blocked. The decision of the Istanbul 1st Criminal Judgeship of Peace also covered T24’s X account, which has approximately 1.9 million followers. Decisions concerning Kısa Dalga, Sol Haber and Evrensel newspapers have also been issued.
During the same period, the X accounts of numerous journalists, including İrfan Değirmenci, Can Bursalı, Fırat Fıstık, Ersin Eroğlu, Meral Danyıldız, Canan Kaya, Ali Tarakçı, Onur Dalar, Dinçer Gökçe and Esra Tokat, were also reportedly blocked from being accessed in Türkiye.
In addition, throughout September 2026, access-blocking orders were issued against hundreds of X accounts belonging to journalists, news organisations, economists, academics, lawyers and other users.
According to Reuters, as of 30 September, a further 147 X accounts had been blocked in the latest wave alone, with those accounts having a combined following of approximately 2.65 million users. In the previous wave, approximately 150 accounts, including those belonging to journalists and media organisations, were reportedly blocked.
According to data from the Freedom of Expression Association (İFÖD), of the 1,270 accounts subject to access-blocking orders in September, only 115 were covered by a court decision. The legal grounds for blocking the remaining 1,155 accounts are unknown. These accounts have a combined following of more than 35 million users.
The scale of these practices in Türkiye directly affects not only press freedom but also the right of millions of people to access news and information.
Moreover, despite X’s stated policies providing certain safeguards for freedom of thought and expression, we are seeing requests to block access being complied with even in the absence of meaningful judicial oversight. X states in its official policies that requests to restrict access to content or accounts may be supported by valid legal documents, such as court orders, and that authorities possessing a court order or other legal documentation should include such documents with their requests. X also states that, unless legally prohibited from doing so, affected users will be notified of such requests.
For this reason, our call to X’s management is clear:
- Thoroughly verify whether requests for access restrictions originating from Türkiye are supported by an independent and explicit court decision.
- Do not consider unilateral requests from administrative authorities, law-enforcement bodies or other public institutions sufficient grounds to block the accounts of journalists and media organisations without independent judicial oversight.
- Examine the legal basis and scope of each request to restrict access to an account or piece of content, and reject requests that are general, vague or disproportionate.
- Where an access restriction is deemed legally necessary, provide the affected user and the public with the highest possible level of information about the source, legal basis and scope of the request.
- Rather than blocking journalists’ and media organisations’ accounts in their entirety, favour targeted and proportionate measures limited to specific content where such measures are claimed to be legally necessary.
- Publish detailed information in X’s transparency reports about requests for access restrictions in Türkiye and X’s responses to those requests.
Press freedom is not merely the right of journalists to carry out their work. It is also the right of citizens to access information from different sources, compare news reports and remain informed about developments concerning the public interest.
When a journalist’s account, a news organisation’s publishing channel or a media organisation’s social media account is blocked without judicial oversight, it affects not only the owner of that account but also all citizens who follow and rely on it.
We call on X to uphold universal human rights and international standards on freedom of expression and press freedom when implementing access restrictions in Türkiye, and to adopt the principle that the accounts of journalists and media organisations should not be blocked without an independent judicial decision.
International Federation of Journalists (IFJ)
European Federation of Journalists (EFJ)
Turkish Journalists’ Union (TGS)
