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US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

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Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#201

Post by jauco »

OkayPhysicist wrote: post #196
DrJaws wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you go from Paris to Warsaw, you still won't need a passport, just a basic ID Schengen area travelling around Europe as European is not much more hassle than moving on the US from one state to the other.

Huh, TIL. I had assumed that you needed a passport, they just didn't do border checks.

In europe we have a kind of mini passport, called person id. Which only works in your own country and other shengen countries. It’s nearly the same cost as a passport (at least in my municipality)

You are required to have a passport (or id) with you (as in, that’s what the law says). Even in your own country. But in your own country a drivers license is usually also sufficient.

But in practice you will almost never be asked to show any of those. In your own country, nor abroad.

Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#203

Post by zevon »

stby wrote: post #47

> Omitting social media information could lead to “visa denial and ineligibility” for future visas, the embassy added. Honest question, how would they detect missing info? If they already knew all my social media profiles, they wouldn't need to ask for it. If I wrote some credible threads on any platform, I assume those would have been detected by someone anyway. Also, I surely wouldn't voluntarily disclose the accou…

Question you and do research on you on the open web as well as on whatever other data they can access / request. You can get selected for some form of in-depth questioning and research on you at a border for many reasons. At that point, it's certainly still possible that they miss some information about you but in times of big data collection by governments, "better" systems to make sense of the data and permissive legislation, it becomes less likely. Especially if you did not prepare in advance (for example: most people who post some hateful or threatful shit probably do not take the greatest care possible to make themselves as untraceable as possible).

I once got detained for about four hours or so at my destination airport. There were multiple rounds of questioning by persons who seemed rather intelligent and based on what they asked, they did some research about me in the meantime (or wanted to achieve that effect - no idea what tactics those people use). There could have been a few reasons why I was questioned in-depth - maybe it was because of a random spot check, maybe because they considered some stuff in my luggage unusual, maybe because I had work affiliations with people who are routinely questioned when entering some countries due to their work. Who knows.

This was many years ago, so I assume they had to do a lot of their research by hand and there would have been limited other data sources available. I imagine this is rather different today.

Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#204

Post by kcplate »

lantry wrote: post #157
kcplate wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A $400 drone can now take out a $2B piece of equipment. That waters the mouth of any adversary. Aren’t you actually arguing for these kind of enhanced vetting measures with this realization? If anti-US sentiment is high and if the barrier to sabotaging a $2B system is a meager $400…why wouldn’t you do everything you could to prevent people who might be inclined, supportive, or even publicly indifferent to doing you…

These "enhanced" vetting measures don't actually provide any protection against these kinds of attacks. All they do is increase the anti-US sentiment, which increases the number of people interested in attacking us.

Sure, it may increase anti-us sentiment, but I don’t think you can confidently say that “enhanced vetting measures don’t actually provide any protection” because there is simply no way to know or measure what didn’t happen if you didn’t have foreknowledge of the planned attack that you foiled by your vetting.

My attitude is, if you try to get in to the US you must want to be here for some reason. If that reason is to create some form of chaos, I don’t give a shit if you are made more irritated by the process. If your reason is peaceful and this discourages you…I’m sorry, it’s unfortunate, but we have folks that wish us harm and we want to protect everyone best we can…including you, Traveler.

If just being inconvenienced makes you want to harm us, well you are exactly the type of person that should probably be vetted out—and hopefully you were.

Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#205

Post by AnthonyMouse »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #148
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Say you let someone in who suicide bombs himself and takes out several Americans. Then a reporter asks the DHS spokesperson how they let someone in the country that had "Death to America" posts all over their social media out in the open for everyone to see but they didn't. Nobody would forgive the government for such a grave oversight. Everything is partisan now. If something bad happens, every media outlet will b…

>Everything is partisan now. You're making it partisan, I wasn't. >If something bad happens, every media outlet will blame the party they don't like for it somehow Ignore the media. If a loved one of yours would be killed by a visa holder who wasn't vetted properly even though his social media profile had all the red flags, who would YOU blame ?

> You're making it partisan, I wasn't.

It isn't you or I who decides that, it's media outlets. And they've decided to be partisan.

> If a loved one of yours would be killed by a visa holder who wasn't vetted properly even though his social media profile had all the red flags, who would YOU blame?

The visa holder.

Also, those kinds of social media posts are public, so what does it have to do with immigration? If you want to blame law enforcement for not investigating the nutters who post on the internet then maybe they should start with the ones posting crazy stuff and investigate who they are, instead of starting with random innocent people and unmasking them with no justification.

Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#206

Post by thisisit »

FirmwareBurner wrote: post #21
casenmgreen wrote: post #5

It seems to me one of the methods of control in oppressive States is to have a multitude of rules, which are impractical to actually adhere to, where failure to adhere provides leverage to State - a "justification" for State to then do whatever it is it decides to do with you (such as deportation without due process).

Play the devil's advocate with me for a bit. Say you let someone in who suicide bombs himself and takes out several Americans. Then a reporter asks the DHS spokesperson how they let someone in the country that had "Death to America" posts all over their social media out in the open for everyone to see but they didn't. Nobody would forgive the government for such a grave oversight. At the airport you already let them…

This is just intellectually dishonest. Its like you have never heard of US surveillance programs.

US Intelligence agencies collect a lot of data about people. Especially the ones who write about "Death to America" on their social media. If we follow your logic and it doesn't happen today then there are bigger problems than the made up issues DHS will have in your imagined future.

Building a profile on someone doesn't require their social media profiles. This is just a bogeyman. As some has pointed out, this is purely to build a case if and when people protest against the government.

Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#207

Post by throw_a_grenade »

jauco wrote: post #201
OkayPhysicist wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh, TIL. I had assumed that you needed a passport, they just didn't do border checks.

In europe we have a kind of mini passport, called person id. Which only works in your own country and other shengen countries. It’s nearly the same cost as a passport (at least in my municipality) You are required to have a passport (or id) with you (as in, that’s what the law says). Even in your own country. But in your own country a drivers license is usually also sufficient. But in practice you will almost never b…

That depends on country, in Poland you don't need to carry any ID on you anymore (you're then required to remember PESEL number, and recite it to police if asked; 11 digits, six of those are birthday).

Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#208

Post by potato3732842 »

ujkhsjkdhf234 wrote: post #188
potato3732842 wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem isn't whether they pay taxes. The problem is that we've effectively increased the number of poor people in the country, or at the very least my state, on a whim. And that imperils all the social safety net programs or at the very least degrades them for the populations that they were intentionally envisioned to serve (which also imperils them, but politically instead of financially).

You've misunderstood my point with mentioning that they pax taxes. If more people are paying taxes then more money should be flowing into these programs, doubly so if more people are using them. If that isn't happening then your problem is with funding.

It doesn't matter if they "pay taxes" if they cost more than they put in.

If I make $36k/yr doing the kind of string together mcjobs you do at that income level, pay $0 in effective income taxes, pay 10k of consumption taxes and I cost the taxpayer $20k in benefits then the state is $10k in the hole per person who lives that way. You multiply these people and the result is obvious.

Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#209

Post by FrustratedMonky »

hypeatei wrote: post #68
slackfan wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has been policy since the Obama admin, where have you been? e: they downvoted him because they hated the truth.

No, I think the downvotes are because of the "both sides"-ism which is used as a deflection tactic to make it seem like it's just an overreaction. As someone else pointed out, what was stated isn't even true.

The 'what about ism' is actually getting out of control with fake images.

remember the 400mil$ jet that Trump got from Qatar (and the US attorney general blessed it, having been a consultant for Qatar).

Facebook and others were flooded by images of Clinton receiving a Helicopter from some middle eastern country. and the tag line was 'nobody complained then'.

The 'right' is actually just making up fake images/videos simply to allow them to say 'what about when Clinton did it'. just completely fake.

Re: US embassy wants 'every social media username of past five years' for new visas

#210

Post by joshka »

For reference, the DS-160 (form to book a visa appointment) question is as follows (for an E3 visa at least, unsure if this is different for different visa classes):

    Do you have a social media presence? Select from the list below each social media platform you have
    used within the last five years. In the space next to the platform’s name, enter the username or
    handle you have used on that platform. Please do not provide your passwords. If you have used more
    than one platform or more than one username or handle on a single platform, click the 'Add Another'
    button to list each one separately. If you have not used any of the listed social media platforms in
    the last five years, select 'None.' 



    Help: Social Media

    Enter information associated with your online presence, including the types of online
    providers/platforms, applications and websites that you use to collaborate, share information, and
    interact with others. List the username, handle, screen-name, or other identifiers associated with
    your social media profile. (You do not need to list accounts designed for use by multiple users
    within a business or other organization.)
The options listed on the form are:

    ASK
    DOUBAN
    FACEBOOK
    FLICKR
    GOOGLE
    INSTAGRAM
    LINKEDIN
    MYSPACE
    PINTEREST
    QZONE
    REDDIT
    SINA
    TENCENT
    TUMBLR
    TWITTER
    TWOO
    VINE
    VKONTAKTE
    YOUKU
    YOUTUBE
    NONE
The next question on the form is also:

    Do you wish to provide information about your presence on any other websites or applications you
    have used within the last five years to create or share content (photos, videos, status updates,
    etc.)?
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