The Regulation on Official Announcements and Advertisements deals with this in Article 63, under the heading of serious violation in visitor traffic, and attaches one of the heaviest commercial sanctions in the legislation: alongside termination of the right to publish, a two-year bar on reapplying.
The prohibition is drawn widely
Article 63(1) prohibits conduct aimed at obstructing, disrupting or rendering ineffective, in whole or in part, the Agency’s duty to distribute official announcements equally to periodicals meeting defined qualifications and conditions, or at unlawfully affecting announcement distribution quotas.
The scope of the article is deliberately written wide: no manipulation of visitor traffic data may be carried out through deliberate and fraudulent conduct and transactions, by any method known or to be developed in the future. The methods are not enumerated; the result and the intent are what matter.
The sanction: the right ends, plus a two-year bar
The third paragraph sets out the consequence: online news sites found to have carried out deliberate and fraudulent conduct and transactions within the scope of this article may not request the publication of official announcements with the same domain name or the same concession holder for two years from the date of notification of the decision terminating the right to publish.
| Consequence | Scope |
|---|---|
| Termination of the right to publish | The existing right disappears |
| Two-year bar on applying | From notification of the decision |
| What the bar attaches to | The same domain name or the same concession holder |
The last row is critical. Had the bar attached only to the domain name, a new domain would allow the operation to continue; had it attached only to the concession holder, a transfer of ownership would get around it. Because the article names both, for two years reapplication is possible neither with the same address nor with the same ownership.
Blocking the measurement tool also has consequences
There is a separate sanction beyond manipulation. Under Article 61(6) the traffic data of online news sites that fail to take the measures necessary for BİK Analitik to function, or fail to cease their obstructing activities, are treated as zero and proceedings are instituted under the relevant legislation.
That is a provision producing a consequence without any requirement of intent: if the measurement script is not working because of a technical oversight, your traffic still counts as zero. See the measurement guide.
What to do in the event of a cyber attack
Unusual movement in traffic is not always the site’s own act. Article 63(2) addresses that possibility and imposes a notification obligation.
Online news sites are obliged to notify the Information and Communication Technologies Authority in writing, immediately from the moment it occurs, of any situation giving the impression that manipulation has been carried out through cyber attacks by others, and to take the necessary technical measures.
The obligation does not end there: following the application, the Agency’s branch directorates must be informed without delay of the situation and of the measures taken, so as to allow them to take precautions concerning their duty to distribute official announcements and advertisements.
The practical upshot
Buying traffic or inflating figures with redirect schemes breaks down in three separate places even if it appears to meet the threshold in the short term: the direct traffic share (10%) will not hold, the average time on page falls, and foreign-sourced traffic is not counted anyway. Those three criteria exist precisely to filter out inflated traffic.
If it is detected, the consequence is not merely losing that month’s quota: the right ends, and for two years you cannot reapply with the same domain name or the same ownership. The risk-return balance is plainly negative.