There were several reports this morning about Turkish authorities blocking most if not all Google services, but it turns out there’s some confusion on the matter.
We’ve learned that Turkey’s Telecommunication and Communication Ministry (TIB), a government body that oversees Internet accessibility in the country, is attempting a blanket ban of a range of IP addresses belonging to Google in an effort to stop people from visiting YouTube.
According to our sources, this move was made because Google altered the IP addresses for the popular Internet video service.
In an attempt to ban those IPs for ‘legal reasons’, the Turkish government appear to have also blocked access to IPs Google uses for other popular services, such as Docs, Analytics, Translate and Books, among many others. Many of them are inaccessible or at least very slow for Turkish Internet users.
It also seems like the authorities are placing the blame on Google and are telling citizens that it’s up to the company to fix the situation.
The Google service accessibility problems started Tuesday night and continue throughout today. Turkey has been blocking access to YouTube since March 2007.