ISTANBUL: Facebook owner Meta said Monday it would “temporarily” shut down its Threads short-messaging service in Turkiye after an order from Ankara’s competition watchdog over data-sharing.
The interim ruling from the Turkish Competition Authority (TCA) has “no impact” for Meta’s other services like Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp in Turkiye, the company said in a statement posted to its website.
“We disagree with the interim order, we believe we are in compliance with all Turkish legal requirements, and we will appeal,” Meta said — although it had “no choice but to temporarily shut down Threads” in Turkiye.
Meta launched Threads last year as a competitor to X (formerly Twitter), with boss Mark Zuckerberg saying in February the service had 130 million monthly users worldwide.
It was available in Turkiye from the start, while European Union users had to wait months for Meta to come up with a version adapted to strict data protection and competition laws.
In its March finding, the TCA had said Meta’s combination of user data from Instagram with people’s Threads profiles “will lead to irreparable harms.”
Given its vast user base, data collection and financial resources, “Meta’s practices in the market constitute a barrier to entry” for prospective competitors, the authority added.
Meta said it would allow existing Threads users to delete or deactivate their profiles ahead of the April 29 cut-off, with a chance of reactivating them should the ruling be overturned.
Meta ‘temporarily’ closes Threads network in Turkiye
https://arab.news/c7rgj
Meta ‘temporarily’ closes Threads network in Turkiye
- Decision was taken to comply with injunction prohibiting data sharing with Instagram
- Ruling do not imlact Meta’s other services like Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp
Study finds nearly half of UK news stories on Muslims show signs of bias
- Centre for Media Monitoring finds 20,000 out of 40,913 articles from 30 major news outlets contain bias and 70% link Muslims to negative behaviors or themes
- Findings reveal ‘deeply concerning evidence of structural bias’ in portrayal of Muslims by UK press and point to ‘systemic problem’ within the media, says center’s director
LONDON: Nearly half of news articles published in the UK in 2025 that referenced Muslims or Islam contained some degree of bias, according to a report issued on Monday by the Centre for Media Monitoring. It also found that about 70 percent of stories linked Muslims to negative behaviors or themes.
The nonprofit organization, which tracks the ways in which Muslims and Islam are portrayed in the media, examined 40,913 articles from 30 major news outlets and found that about 20,000 showed some form of bias.
The study looked at “structural patterns” in coverage that “shape public narratives” about Muslims amid rising hostility toward the community.
“As the largest study of its kind ever conducted in the UK, this report presents deeply concerning evidence of structural bias in how Muslims are portrayed in the UK press,” said Rizwana Hamid, the director of the organization.
It found that 70 percent of the articles it reviewed highlighted negative aspects related to Muslims, though not all of the stories were biased in themselves. The wider patterns were also troubling: 44 percent of the coverage omitted key context, 17 percent relied on generalizations, and 13 percent included outright misrepresentation.
Taken together, the monitoring center said, the findings amounted to evidence of an “information integrity crisis” that distorts public understanding, and “a deeply concerning trend” in reporting on Muslims.
The research points to a “systemic problem within our media ecosystem,” Hamid said.
“When entire communities are repeatedly framed through lenses of suspicion or threat, it inevitably shapes public attitudes, political debate and the everyday lives of British Muslims,” she added.
News brands targeting right-wing audiences were more likely to produce biased coverage, the report found.
The Spectator magazine and GB News were identified as having the highest proportion of “very biased” articles, and as the “worst across all five bias categories”: negative framing, generalizations, misrepresentation, lack of context, and problematic headlines.
Other outlets highlighted for displaying high levels of biased content about Muslims included The Telegraph, The Jewish Chronicle, Daily Express, The Sun, Daily Mail and The Times.
In contrast, the BBC, other broadcasters and left-leaning outlets recorded the lowest rates of bias in the study.
The research comes as British Muslims report rising levels of discrimination. Official figures published in October revealed that religious hate crimes against Muslims rose by 19 percent in the year to March 2025 compared with the previous 12 months.
