Internet censorship in Turkey: University students' opinions

The aim of this paper is to study university students’ opinions toward online censorship with references to their socio‐political and economic variables. Considering the upwards trend and the increasing number of online restrictions in Turkey,the opinions of university students (n=138) are thought to give significant findings. The questionnaire aimed to collect dataon some chosen aspects of censorship which are internet access regulation by legal authorities, online pornographiccontent, websites distributing illegal and crime related information and the political and religious aspects of the internetcensorship. The findings about these four basic aspects toward the online censorship revealed that despite the highproportion of approval, participants have a confused and inconsistent attitude towards the issue especially within theapplication and the idea of censorship. In a broader aspect, the findings can be interpreted as a sign of university students’insufficient knowledge and understanding towards the current situation and the possible future of online censorship inTurkey