SUMMARY
- Twitch was recently shut down in South Korea.
- Twitch and Kick were both recently banned in Turkey.
It’s long-known by now that Twitch has been preparing to exit the South Korean markets. It was announced back in December 2023 that the streaming platform would discontinue its operations in the country because of “prohibitively expensive” operating costs from February 27, 2024.
Recently just ahead of the company’s exit on February 27, 2024, Twitch has been faced with fines worth $300,000. And now it seems like South Korea isn’t the only country where Twitch will cease its operations.
Twitch and Kick are now banned in Turkey
Now, Twitch and its competitor, Kick, have both come under the axe multiple times in the past. These were majorly due to concerns about gambling-related content being streamed on their platforms.
The Turkey National Lottery Association imposed the ban hammer on both websites, because of concerns over gambling. Consequently, on February 21, 2024, the news about Turkey blocking access to Kick spread like wildfire.
Journalist Ibrahim Haskoloğlu reported that Turkish officials “stated that Kick’s entry into Turkey was to attract Turkish youth to roulette.” Two days later, the country has reportedly served the same treatment to Twitch.
Haskoloğlu stated that the streaming site was “blocked by the decision of the General Directorate of National Lottery Administration.” Ibrahim also mentioned that access to the site would be halted in 24 hours.
Why did Turkey ban Twitch and Kick?
The journalist reportedly claims that the BTK, the Information and Communication Technologies Authority of Turkey, started investigating Twitch. This was after Kick broadcasters, post the Kick ban, claimed that a similar kind of content was being streamed on the Amazon-owned platform.
Another reason for Kick’s ban was that the platform is backed by co-founders of Stake dot com, which is an online gambling platform. Ibrahim shared the information via a tweet on X, which read, “BTK first shut down Kick due to its gambling content.”
🔴#SONDAKİKA | Türkiye, Uluslararası Kumar şirketine ait olan Kick platformu Kick’e erişim engeli getirdi.
Konuştuğum Türk yetkililer, Kick’in Türkiye’ye girmesini Türk gençlerini rulete çekmek olduğunu belirtiyordu.
Bu haberi yaptığımda da bazı yayıncılar beni yalancılıkla… https://t.co/CjsVaiw4hY pic.twitter.com/kNNwcfrCNC
— ibrahim Haskoloğlu (@haskologlu) February 21, 2024
They add, “When broadcasters on Kick showed that the same incident was taking place on Twitch, BTK also investigated Twitch. As Kick publishers said, Twitch was also closed after it was detected that gambling content was on Twitch.”
Back in 2022, the Amazon-made platform made significant alterations to its gambling policy. The platform received severe criticism from top streamers such as Pokimane after one of its creators, Sliker, confessed to scamming his fans and fellow streamers. The creator reportedly milked hundreds of thousands of dollars from his fans to support his gambling addiction.