Netflix displays distorted Türkiye map, stirs controversy

With more than 220 million subscribers, Netflix is among the world’s most popular streaming platforms and hosts some of the most-watched TV shows and movies.

However, not everything featured in the streaming giant’s content is accurate - even in documentaries, such as the Netflix original docuseries “Pepsi, Where's My Jet?”.

20 minutes into the docuseries, which aired on November 17th, is a map that displays Türkiye’s northeast as Armenia.

This is not the first mistake of its kind spotted in the streaming giant’s content.

A TV miniseries called “The Spy” featuring Sacha Baron Cohen, which was released on Netflix in September 2019, also displayed a distorted map of Türkiye in its fourth episode.

In one scene, the camera shows a regional wall map which depicts Türkiye divided, with the Southeastern Anatolia region and surrounding Turkish territory marked as separate lands.

Borders are among the most crucial national security issues. Thus, experts say such “mistakes” can hardly be considered in a favourable manner. 

These mistakes, which happen to be made repetitively, create the perception that they are made on purpose to spread disinformation.

“In today's world, it is possible to find accurate information from many sources,” Prof. Dr. Zakir Avsar, the dean of Ankara Hacı Bayram Veli University Faculty of Communication, told TRT Haber.

He explained that viewing such mistakes in an optimist manner “contributes” to the wider and faster spread of false information.

“Unfortunately, Türkiye is the target of this kind of grey propaganda in many respects today,” says Prof. Dr. Avsar, referring to a kind of propaganda that is “carried out with insidious methods” and “based on disinformation”.

Of course, “historical problems between countries cannot be resolved and borders cannot be changed with distortions of history and geography,” Avsar said, underlining that the purpose of this type of disinformation is “to keep the hostilities alive”.