An internet-based disinformation campaign run by the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ) late in 2013 was run by computers located in the police department headquarters in Yıldız, Ankara, according to Hürriyet daily columnist Abdulkadir Selvi.
A series of doctored video and audio recordings were released via several Twitter accounts in December 2013, accompanied by raids on several people with close links to the government, with several accused of corruption. It was later found the prosecutors in charge of the investigations and the judges who approved the raids were FETÖ operatives doing the bidding of their fugitive leader Fetullah Gülen. The aim was to topple the government, led by then Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, whose economic, educational and social policies were opposed by the cult.
According to Selvi, the Twitter accounts @fuatavni, @bascalan, @haramzadeler and @bilaloglan opened before Dec. 15, 2013, started to release the doctored recordings as soon as FETÖ began its judiciary and disinformation offensive against the government, supported by FETÖ's media arms, STV, Zaman and Bugün.
In his columns, Selvi explained the persecution and vilification process. First, a target was chosen directly by Gülen, who has been living in a Pennsylvanian compound for more than a decade but is known to manage the day-to-day minutia of his cult.
Once a target was established, "Tall Cevdet," Gülen's main point man concerning such affairs, would contact a special team. First, a prearranged "secret informant" came forward. After, prosecutors and judges took over the matter, ordering the necessary telephone bugging, as well as the collection and doctoring of evidence. "And then at a prearranged date, the target's door is approached at 5 a.m. in the morning," wrote Selvi, noting that the information that led to the raid on the National Intelligence Agency (MİT) trucks on Jan. 14, 2014 had come from an informant in Güvercinlik, Ankara.
However, Selvi also said: "Even before the target was detained, FETÖ's media organs and social media agents would begin distributing reports justifying the process in an effort to persuade the public. Even before [journalist] İlhan Selçuk was taken to the precinct, phone tap recordings were being leaked."
All the information concocted before a raid would find its way to FETÖ's media and social media arms, which would in turn release the information in an effort to shape the narrative.
Selvi wrote that the Twitter account@ bascalan's sole target was President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, consistently trying to portray him as a thief. "All the while these accounts were being controlled from Pennsylvania, with the information and publication processed in separate addresses," he explained.
On April 4, 2014, Turkcell telecommunication company told the Information and Technologies Communication Authority (BTK) that the @bascalan account, with its constant attacks against Erdoğan, was opened and actively used from an IP address located at the police department headquarters. According to Selvi, the IP address belonged to the intelligence section of the police department, demonstrating just how deep FETÖ's infiltration into the state institutions really was.
The BTK then conveyed the information to the police department, responding that the @bascalan IP did not belong to police intelligence but to a different computer located in Istanbul and handed two suspects to the prosecutor's office. Soon after, the two individuals fled overseas.
Turkcell has identified Mesut Biçer as the user of the @bascalan account originating from the police department. Biçer was subsequently fired based on his links to FETÖ.
Selvi has analyzed the police department's behavior, arguing: "It may all be a conspiracy by FETÖ or the police department's self-preservation reflex. Still, all of this is only the tip of the iceberg. Even now, if these social media accounts are seriously investigated, very important links could be uncovered."
BELATED RESPONSE
Each of the social media accounts use by FETÖ to attack the government was actually used by several individuals who pooled their resources in preparation for individual attacks. Among the members of the clandestine network are members of the judiciary, the MİT, the gendarmerie and other critical state and media officials.
Selvi said that criminal complaints were submitted by Erdoğan on April 17, 2014 against @bascalan and on Aug. 7 against @fuatavni. Three days after the @fuatavni complaint, Erdoğan was elected the first directly elected president of Turkey.
Still, no one was arrested. Erdoğan, in his Aug. 7 complaint, openly says Said Sefa was one of those behind the @fuatavni account and asked for searches of his home and office, and the seizure of data.
On July 15, the night of the coup attempt, Sefa was able to post the tweet: "Tanks are climbing toward Çankaya", in reference to the previous presidential compound that now serves as the prime minister's residence. "It is apparent that even being the prime minister is not enough. After July 15, a prosecutor began an investigation, but Said Sefa had already escaped abroad," Selvi wrote.
Another behind the @fuatavni account was found to be the Prime Ministry Date Collection Center's Intelligence Chief Akif Mustafa Koçyiğit. However, this came to light only after July 15.
Selvi said FETÖ's attack on Turkey's democratically elected government began on Feb. 7, 2012, when senior MİT officials, including its head Hakan Fidan, were called in for questioning by the Ankara prosecutor, who accused them of undermining the state by holding secret meetings with the PKK in Oslo, Sweden. Once they failed to topple the government, they initiated the December 2013 judicial coup attempt, to be followed by the real deal on July 15, 2016.
The columnist wrote that despite what was said and done, the most unfortunate development was the failure to detain the most senior operatives of FETÖ, most of whom have fled abroad.