Turkey Blocks Tor Browsing Network

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For years, Turkey has been known as a nation to suppress dissent and journalists, and now it is turning its attention towards the freedom of internet access.

Turkey has blocked direct access to the Tor anonymous browsing network as part of a wider crackdown on the ways people circumvent internet censorship.

Internet advocacy group Turkey Block recently confirmed that the Tor anonymity network has been blocked in the country.

In a statement, Turkey Block said, "Our study indicates that service providers have successfully complied with a government order to ban VPN services."

The free virtual private network (VPN) has exploded in popularity in recent years as countries expand their cybersecurity laws to allow for them to have an increased ability to snoop on unsuspecting citizens in the name of state security.

Users of commercially available VPNs – typically used by people within a country to watch or read content not legally available in their own country – have also been affected, as per Turkey Blocks.

Tor is an anonymity service that conceals the browsing footprints of users when they go online. Tor uses a sophisticated protocol of encryption and random bouncing of packets through connected networks in order to hide the user's location.