What Does Article 29 of the Social Media Regulation Say?

Presented to the Turkish Grand National Assembly and whose 28 articles have been accepted so far social media editing (The Proposal on Amending the Press Law and Some Laws), with its article 29, has created a great controversy since the first day the bill was formed. Debates in Parliament are now to article 29 By the way, there was tension in the Parliament about this article.

Well, the social media regulation, which is on the agenda in social media and in the Parliament, What is Article 29? What does this item tell us?

Article 29 of the social media regulation:

ARTICLE 29:

The following article has been added to come after article 217 of the Turkish Penal Code dated 26/9/2004 and numbered 5237.

“Publicly disseminating misleading information

ARTICLE 217/A: (1) A person who publicly disseminates false information regarding the internal and external security, public order and general health of the country in a way that is suitable for disturbing the public peace, just for the purpose of creating anxiety, fear or panic among the people, is liable for a period of one year to three years. punishable by imprisonment.

(2) If the crime is committed by concealing the real identity of the perpetrator or within the framework of the activity of an organization, the penalty given in accordance with the above paragraph is increased by half.”

Article 217 of the Turkish Penal Code, to which Article 29 will be included:

“Provocation to disobey the law

ARTICLE 217- (1) A person who openly incites the public to disobey the laws is punished with imprisonment from six months to two years or a judicial fine if the provocation is suitable to disturb the public peace.”

What is the justification for Article 29?

“Freedom of thought and opinion (expression) is one of the fundamental rights that contribute to the formation of a democratic society by enabling public discussion and opinion formation. The basis and ground of freedom of expression is described as the “market of ideas” in the doctrine. Pluralism, tolerance and open-mindedness, which are indispensable for a democratic society; They are the most basic requirements that lead to the development of the individual and therefore the progress of the society.

These requirements form the basis of freedom of expression. Freedom of expression consists of three elements: the right to access news or information, the right to hold an opinion and the right to express one’s opinion, and it protects these areas. The right to access news or information; It enables individuals to freely use communication tools, to easily access news and information sources, and to choose from among the different views in the market of ideas, thus creating their own (original) thoughts and opinions.

In essence, freedom of expression, which is one of the negative status rights, brings negative obligations for states. In addition, the level of fundamental rights and freedoms reached today, with the effect of the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights and the examination of individual applications by the Constitutional Court, also reveals the positive obligations of states in terms of freedom of expression. There is no doubt that this developing positive obligation will be to pave the way for and develop freedoms.

Due to the widespread use of technological developments and the internet, digital platforms have unpredictably increased the speed of dissemination of information or news, which can be described as more “content”, and considerably shortened the time of mind-filtering, analysis and evaluation of these contents. At this point, the anonymous environment provided by the internet has led to an increase in false, false or manipulative content.

In particular, content created with special motives and spread in an organized manner or sharing via bot accounts rapidly increases disinformation on the internet. The fabricated content that is purposefully created in this way negatively affects product safety in the market of ideas, manipulates the opinion formation of individuals and undermines the innocence of the democratic environment by mortgaging free thought.

As a result, while developing mechanisms and opportunities to facilitate people’s access to news or information, the need to take measures to ensure the security of news or information and to take measures to ensure that free and original ideas clash or compete in a democratic environment arises.

With the article, it is regulated as a crime to publicly disseminate false information about the internal and external security, public order and general health of the country in a way that is suitable for disturbing the public peace, just for the purpose of creating anxiety, fear or panic among the people. It has been emphasized that this crime is a concrete danger crime by seeking that the act is suitable for “disrupting the public peace”. In addition, in order not to confuse these acts, which are described as “disinformation”, with the right of individuals to express or inform their individual opinions, it is sought as an additional element that the act is carried out with the motive of creating anxiety, fear or panic among the public.

It should be noted that the content subject to disinformation may be either false information or falsified information regarding the internal and external security, public order and general health of the country. There is no doubt that this crime, created within the scope of crimes against public peace, regulates a different area from the other crimes in the Chapter. In addition, if the crime is committed by hiding the real identity of the perpetrator or within the framework of the activity of an organization, it is foreseen as a reason for increasing the penalty.”

What is the minimum and maximum penalty for the crimes specified in Article 29?

With the new regulation, article 29, which will be included in article 217 of the Turkish Penal Code, will apply to persons who commit the specified crimes. imprisonment from one to three years provides for delivery. On the other hand, if it is determined that the crime was committed through anonymous accounts, This penalty can be up to 4.5 years.