After Twitter, this was expected. Just couple of hours ago, leaked audio recordings were uploaded to Youtube which show "Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, National Intelligence Organization (MİT) Undersecretary Hakan Fidan, Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Feridun Sinirlioğlu and Deputy Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Güler are heard discussing possible intervention into Syria and possible reactions from the world"
They were planning to organize artificial attacks from Syrian border and put the blame on Syria and strength Erdogan's position before local elections.
It's pretty ghastly that people are willing to fabricate rationale for getting into war. I really hope that the Turks dispose of their leaders expediently and forcefully.
No where in that recording mention about strengthening Erdogan's position before local elections. On the contrary they mention that Erdogan actually not acting on it all, one of the voice proposes that Head of Turkish Army and couple of other officials should get together while PM present and clarify on how to help rebel groups.
Is there any information about when the recordings were made?
I ask because, well, after weeks knowing that their conversations were being intercepted, it would be utterly stupid to still discuss sensitive matters on the phone.
If on the contrary, they're old recordings, this seems like a strategy by the spies to slowly release damning evidence. Nice.
I disagree with your last sentence. Because of the problem in Syria our borders are not secure and Turkey is trying to solve this problem diplomatically for a year.
Recently ISID threatened Turkey to attack Sulaiman Sah and after that government started to think about a military attack to that area.
You can't just say "they want to attack Syria to strength Erdogan's position."
It was interesting when we saw governments attempt it last time, too. And then they stopped, because they were overthrown.
I wonder if this is going to be a law, now ... a government that attempts to dismantle the internet a piece at a time in their country is going to fail.
Blocking social media sites and expecting it to reduce tension is like turning off TV & radio broadcasting and expecting people to remain in their homes; it's a failure to understand modern systems of control. Orwell doesn't work at all. Huxley is your only hope Turkey :P
Orwell does work, North Korea and Cuba are examples of that. But you can't create an Orwellian police state over night, and those sorts of oppressive regimes tend to be unstable (Libya, East Germany, Romania, etc. all gone now).
They aren't that naive -- it's one of very many systems to exert control over. Their issue is that Twitter doesn't bow to pressure in the same manner that CNN Turkey does.
I totally agree. There are so many venues on internet you can express yourself. However on a limited time frame it works. Only a week away from the elections, not many people will be able to reconnect through other means.
It is amazing the DNS system lasted this long. Turkey seems ready to push over this house of cards. Hopefully a namecoin type system will rise from the ashes. Trust without cryptography is dead.
For this kind of censorship, namecoin wouldn't have helped. Turkey could've just watched the namecoin blockchain and update their IP blacklist directly from it.
A Turkish scholar have nice analysis on this. She thinks that the Turkish government does not seek to completely ban the spread of information and knows that it's not possible. Instead the government tries to demonize the social media to keep it's supporters away from it.
The Internet was designed to withstand damage due to nuclear warfare and other external disruptions. It apparently was not designed to reliably withstand serious attacks of malicious third parties controlling some segments of it.
I am not supporting Turkish Govt here, nor I have any concern with this country.
If a classified video is made live on a Turkish Video website, would US Govt block it or not?
or Do you approve of releasing classified videos or calls?., because according to my understanding regardless of the content of those videos or calls, they are in violation of 'privacy' and perhaps are classified too.?
I am just making sure, that I do not become a victim of double-standards here... :/
The US government practices pretty much no direct censorship of the internet. You can read about the number of laws that have been struck down, and the handful of cases where domains/servers have been seized:
I am a native Turkish speaker and I listened the recording. For one thing I did not hear anything you would not expect to hear from most of the statesman in the west in a similar situation.
Conversation is about the future stance of Turkey for the civil war in Syria and lack of enough resolve for the last 3 years to intervene properly, and that does not mean directly involving but not supplying ammo to rebel groups against Assad regime. They are complaining that the civil war took a turn toward total destabilization of the region, especially after Al-Qaeda linked group called ISIL[1] started taking over anti-Assad rebel groups. They fear that if ISIL becomes an armed power next to Turkey's border it will be a huge security concern. The head of intelligence agency says that if Turkey going to engage against them in the future it should be done so on their terms but not the other side's choosing. The mention of alleged provocation of the head of intelligence by his minions firing rockets from the Syrian side into Turkish side is correct. He says his men can do that. However he says that in the context they want to be the one starting the assault on ISIL, not the other way around. They argue that if they should wait for the ISIL to attack first. So again it is about engaging al-Qaeda linked group but not starting war with Syria. In this recording foreign minister mention that they want to avoid any conflict with Syria due to their capabilities. I do believe that any war with Syria destabilizes Turkey grossly and it is definitely something they would want to avoid and they did.
The al-Qaeda linked group (ISIL) invaded one the Syrian village about [4] 30-40km away from the Turkish border about a week ago. And like many Turkish I learned something new last week. In that village there's the tomb[2] of the grandfather of the founder of Ottoman Empire. Surrounding of that tomb which is a tiny tiny land in that village belongs to Turkish Republic. The monument is protected by Turkish soldiers who reside there permanently. After ISIL invaded the surrounding village they demanded [5] that Turkish soldiers leave the monument. However that land is part of Turkish sovereign land and Turkey reacted that she would intervene forcefully. Even we have been reading that couple of F-16 fighters are kept ready to take off on the tarmac and special ops can intervene in 90 seconds.
In the recording, foreign minister mentions the option of intervention to ISIL using the Tomb as an excuse, even if they do not attack monument and the soldiers. They mention that world would support such intervention since this is a al-Qaeda linked group. So they would like to attack ISIL fully in the whole region.
They are not warmongering against Syria, and they fear that ISIL's presence could become permanent and can become something of huge security concern for years to come.. In the recording, head of Turkish intelligence mention about lack of resolve of the government. He says if they did not intervene while thousands of people died, still attack on the Tomb of Suleyman Shah is a weaker argument to start an attack.
Probably we need to consider how US would react if an Al-Qaeda linked group starts taking over northern villages of Mexico while a civil war is going on in there.
However the main post is about YouTube ban due to this recording. I just wanted to give another perspective.
> I did not hear anything you would not expect to hear from most of the statesman in the west in a similar situation.
What are you talking about?!?
The head of secret service states: "If need be, I'll send 4 lads to Syria. I'll make them fire 8 rockets back to Turkey in order to produce a valid reason to go to war. We can make them attack the Soliman Shah mausoleum"
Is this NORMAL in your opinion? Does that have anything defendable?
>Probably we need to consider how US would react if an Al-Qaeda linked group starts taking over northern villages of Mexico while a civil war is going on in there.
Why would "al-Qaeda linked" groups be considered more dangerous than the mass-murdering cartels? Mexico is almost a failed state and we haven't invaded.
Your text seems almost like Turkish gov't pawn propaganda.
a 4 hour account, and a very well put together defense of the recording. Any one that speaks Turkish and listened to the full recording will not mistake the following for anything else, "I can send 4 of my guys there (Syria) to fire rockets".
>For one thing I did not hear anything you would not expect to hear from most of the statesman in the west in a similar situation.
So lets cut the bullshit. Attacking your own people to create fear and thus justify war means is TERRORISM.
I hope enough copies of whatever damning evidence the Turkish government wants to suppress are being disseminated outside of Turkey as well as inside the country.
What's really interesting to me is that it seems like some very, very powerful and well-connected player, who either has access to the communication networks or people at the top of the Turkish totem pole is trying to use social media to destabilize/overthrow a government.
I don't know much about what's going on in Turkey and the corruption that's being exposed is definitely hugely damning, but I'm curious if there is any credible idea as to who is behind all this leaking? It definitely isn't a group of your average concerned citizens.
Isn't this the wrong approach, though? I mean, sure you can try to block people form finding the truth, but at least be covert about it; this is plain naïve.
Their methodology is just putting them (the government) into the spotlight. Shouldn't they try and divert the attention?
This ensures people find the truth sooner rather than later. I feel like they've been played by some high-up in the government techs person who just got sick of the corruption and decided to add a catalyst.
[+] [-] _pgpz|12 years ago|reply
They were planning to organize artificial attacks from Syrian border and put the blame on Syria and strength Erdogan's position before local elections.
[+] [-] cryoshon|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yread|12 years ago|reply
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/23/turkey-shoots-d...
[+] [-] shna|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] narag|12 years ago|reply
I ask because, well, after weeks knowing that their conversations were being intercepted, it would be utterly stupid to still discuss sensitive matters on the phone.
If on the contrary, they're old recordings, this seems like a strategy by the spies to slowly release damning evidence. Nice.
[+] [-] contulluipeste|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] gkhnarik|12 years ago|reply
Recently ISID threatened Turkey to attack Sulaiman Sah and after that government started to think about a military attack to that area.
You can't just say "they want to attack Syria to strength Erdogan's position."
[+] [-] ljd|12 years ago|reply
If your site has a dependency on YouTube, your site isn't going to be functioning in Turkey.
It's like Netflix's Chaos Monkey [0], but in real life.
[0]http://techblog.netflix.com/2012/07/chaos-monkey-released-in...
[+] [-] arbitrage|12 years ago|reply
I wonder if this is going to be a law, now ... a government that attempts to dismantle the internet a piece at a time in their country is going to fail.
[+] [-] bergie|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] corkill|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] selimthegrim|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] DickingAround|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] InclinedPlane|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ihsw|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shna|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zmanian|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] icebraining|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mrtksn|12 years ago|reply
here is the full article: https://medium.com/p/cb596ce5f27
[+] [-] nine_k|12 years ago|reply
Time to adapt.
[+] [-] toyg|12 years ago|reply
Note how it's not TCP/IP failing here.
[+] [-] sliverstorm|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] frade33|12 years ago|reply
I am not supporting Turkish Govt here, nor I have any concern with this country.
If a classified video is made live on a Turkish Video website, would US Govt block it or not?
or Do you approve of releasing classified videos or calls?., because according to my understanding regardless of the content of those videos or calls, they are in violation of 'privacy' and perhaps are classified too.?
I am just making sure, that I do not become a victim of double-standards here... :/
[+] [-] orik|12 years ago|reply
Wikileaks hasn't been taken down.
If someone did have a recording of a Classified Video/Call I guess it would be up to their discretion to leak or not to leak.
[+] [-] dublinben|12 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship_in_the_Uni...
[+] [-] corkill|12 years ago|reply
Next move bye bye Facebook...or internet.
Any way to build a mobile app that rotates servers enough to circumvent this kind of blocking?
[+] [-] clickok|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] arasatasaygin|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shna|12 years ago|reply
Conversation is about the future stance of Turkey for the civil war in Syria and lack of enough resolve for the last 3 years to intervene properly, and that does not mean directly involving but not supplying ammo to rebel groups against Assad regime. They are complaining that the civil war took a turn toward total destabilization of the region, especially after Al-Qaeda linked group called ISIL[1] started taking over anti-Assad rebel groups. They fear that if ISIL becomes an armed power next to Turkey's border it will be a huge security concern. The head of intelligence agency says that if Turkey going to engage against them in the future it should be done so on their terms but not the other side's choosing. The mention of alleged provocation of the head of intelligence by his minions firing rockets from the Syrian side into Turkish side is correct. He says his men can do that. However he says that in the context they want to be the one starting the assault on ISIL, not the other way around. They argue that if they should wait for the ISIL to attack first. So again it is about engaging al-Qaeda linked group but not starting war with Syria. In this recording foreign minister mention that they want to avoid any conflict with Syria due to their capabilities. I do believe that any war with Syria destabilizes Turkey grossly and it is definitely something they would want to avoid and they did.
The al-Qaeda linked group (ISIL) invaded one the Syrian village about [4] 30-40km away from the Turkish border about a week ago. And like many Turkish I learned something new last week. In that village there's the tomb[2] of the grandfather of the founder of Ottoman Empire. Surrounding of that tomb which is a tiny tiny land in that village belongs to Turkish Republic. The monument is protected by Turkish soldiers who reside there permanently. After ISIL invaded the surrounding village they demanded [5] that Turkish soldiers leave the monument. However that land is part of Turkish sovereign land and Turkey reacted that she would intervene forcefully. Even we have been reading that couple of F-16 fighters are kept ready to take off on the tarmac and special ops can intervene in 90 seconds.
In the recording, foreign minister mentions the option of intervention to ISIL using the Tomb as an excuse, even if they do not attack monument and the soldiers. They mention that world would support such intervention since this is a al-Qaeda linked group. So they would like to attack ISIL fully in the whole region.
They are not warmongering against Syria, and they fear that ISIL's presence could become permanent and can become something of huge security concern for years to come.. In the recording, head of Turkish intelligence mention about lack of resolve of the government. He says if they did not intervene while thousands of people died, still attack on the Tomb of Suleyman Shah is a weaker argument to start an attack.
Probably we need to consider how US would react if an Al-Qaeda linked group starts taking over northern villages of Mexico while a civil war is going on in there.
However the main post is about YouTube ban due to this recording. I just wanted to give another perspective.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State_of_Iraq_and_the_L... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomb_of_Suleyman_Shah [3] https://plus.google.com/109044970213631232914/about?gl=us&hl... [4] https://www.google.com/maps/place/Tomb+of+Suleyman+Shah/@36.... [5] http://www.worldbulletin.net/turkey/132062/isil-deadline-for...
[+] [-] yawz|12 years ago|reply
What are you talking about?!?
The head of secret service states: "If need be, I'll send 4 lads to Syria. I'll make them fire 8 rockets back to Turkey in order to produce a valid reason to go to war. We can make them attack the Soliman Shah mausoleum"
Is this NORMAL in your opinion? Does that have anything defendable?
[+] [-] pessimizer|12 years ago|reply
Why would "al-Qaeda linked" groups be considered more dangerous than the mass-murdering cartels? Mexico is almost a failed state and we haven't invaded.
[+] [-] 3327|12 years ago|reply
a 4 hour account, and a very well put together defense of the recording. Any one that speaks Turkish and listened to the full recording will not mistake the following for anything else, "I can send 4 of my guys there (Syria) to fire rockets".
>For one thing I did not hear anything you would not expect to hear from most of the statesman in the west in a similar situation.
So lets cut the bullshit. Attacking your own people to create fear and thus justify war means is TERRORISM.
[+] [-] vajorie|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MimiZ|12 years ago|reply
It's like the whole world is watching...how could they be so stupid.
What are they going to do next? Block Google? Apparently they top the list of "government requests that request content removal": http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkey-tops-google-content-...
[+] [-] darkhorn|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] erichurkman|12 years ago|reply
Long live Sneaker Net.
[+] [-] josephschmoe|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tzaman|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] theverse|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jann|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blendergasket|12 years ago|reply
I don't know much about what's going on in Turkey and the corruption that's being exposed is definitely hugely damning, but I'm curious if there is any credible idea as to who is behind all this leaking? It definitely isn't a group of your average concerned citizens.
[+] [-] jballanc|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] spoiler|12 years ago|reply
Their methodology is just putting them (the government) into the spotlight. Shouldn't they try and divert the attention?
This ensures people find the truth sooner rather than later. I feel like they've been played by some high-up in the government techs person who just got sick of the corruption and decided to add a catalyst.
[+] [-] MCarusi|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stephengillie|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] logfromblammo|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] bayesianhorse|12 years ago|reply
On some part, yes, the Turkish government tries to restrict free speech, on the the other hand they seem to be abysmally bad at it!
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]