TurkeyLaw on Regulation of Internet Publications, Game Platforms' Age Rating and Parental Controls
Law No. 5651, Ek Madde 5, added by Law No. 7578 ()
In force since .
An age-appropriate design code rule binding private bodies.
As of .
What it requires
- Applies to a game platform; the representative duty applies to a platform based abroad with more than 100,000 daily accesses from Turkey (Additional Article 5(1)-(2)). In force since , six months after Law No. 7578 was published on (Article 27(1)(a)).
- Do not offer a game that has not been rated under the prescribed procedure, unless you rate it at the highest age criterion, and remove content that has not been rated properly (Additional Article 5(1)).
- If you are a game platform based abroad with more than 100,000 daily accesses from Turkey, appoint a natural or legal person as your representative in Turkey, tell the Authority the representative's details, and show the representative's contact details on your website where they can be seen and reached easily (Additional Article 5(2)).
- Provide clear, understandable and easy-to-use parental control tools that let a parent control the account settings and make purchases, rentals and paid memberships subject to the parent's permission or approval (Additional Article 5(3)).
- Give the Authority the information and documents it requests about your compliance, including your corporate structure, information systems and data processing mechanisms, immediately and within a period of no more than fifteen days that it sets (Additional Article 5(4)).
These lines are LexLint's reading of the law's text, as of .
What it reaches
Covered services
A game platform; the representative duty applies to a game platform based abroad with more than 100,000 daily accesses from Turkey.
Obligation class
Design code
What this law does
Additional Article 5 of the Law on Regulation of Internet Publications, added by Article 23 of Law 7578 (), bars a game platform from offering games that have not been rated properly, though it may offer an unrated game if it rates the game at the highest age criterion. A game platform based abroad with more than 100,000 daily accesses from Turkey must appoint a natural or legal person as its representative in Turkey and notify the Authority of the representative's details.
A game platform must provide clear, understandable and easy-to-use parental control tools, including mechanisms for controlling account settings and for making purchases, rentals and paid memberships subject to a parent's permission or approval.
The Authority may ask a game platform for explanations about its corporate structure, information systems and data processing mechanisms, and the platform must give the Authority the information and documents it requests immediately and within a period of no more than fifteen days that the Authority sets. If a platform fails to fulfil a duty within thirty days of the Authority's notice, the Head of the Authority may fine it from 1,000,000 to 10,000,000 Turkish lira.
If the platform still has not fulfilled the duty thirty days after that fine is served, the Head may impose a second fine of 10,000,000 to 30,000,000 Turkish lira. If the duty is still unfulfilled thirty days after the second fine is served, the Head may apply to a criminal judgeship of peace to narrow the platform's internet bandwidth by thirty percent.
Article 27(1)(a) of Law 7578 has Articles 22 and 23 take effect six months after the Law's publication on , and Additional Article 5 has bound since .
When LexLint raises it
When your app profile says your app serves under-18s.