Alp Toker

Joint Forum ‘Referendum Result and Future for Freedom of Expression in Turkey’

British Turkish technologist Alp Toker founded Turkey Blocks using his own savings after being unable to find out what happened to friends and relatives in the aftermath of the Ankara bombings in 2015. Using Raspberry Pi based technology, Turkey Blocks detects mass-scale social media censorship, internet restrictions and power outages in real-time. Using this tool, Turkey Blocks has since broken news of more than 14 mass-censorship incidents online during politically significant events. The tool has proven so successful that it has been implemented in other locations around the world.