
“Please enter information associated with your online presence” - eplanit
https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2016/06/23/2016-14848/agency-information-collection-activities-arrival-and-departure-record-forms-i-94-and-i-94w-and#h-11
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ersiees
This won't help feds a bit to fight terrorism. Since no terrorist will give
his social media ids. Just like the questionnaires which ask you directly if
you are a terrorist. This won't help fight terrorism. The only two things that
it could possibly change are: people who don't give they're social media ids
are treated as if they were guilty and the government knows even more about
innocent people.

~~~
pattisapu
Someone who purposely enters wrong information in the field could be
prosecuted for that reason.

That could be helpful to a prosecutor trying to get a known terrorist where
there's not enough evidence beyond a reasonable doubt for the other crimes.

~~~
chrismcb
If they can't prove this person is a terrorist, how can they prosecute then
when the person claims they aren't a terrorist?

~~~
brokenmachine
Why are you asking questions?? I think you must have something to hide...

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tvanantwerp
Aside from the fact that this will not help to legitimately identify
terrorists at all, the change is also estimated to cost nearly $300 million
annually to administer. Not just useless, but insanely expensive too.

If you want to give them a piece of your mind, you'll have to mail a physical
letter to U.S. Customs and Border Protection in DC before August 22.

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DanBC
It'd be interesting to know how many people get turned away from the US for
their social media posts.

Here one famous case from 2012.

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16810312](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16810312)

> The 26-year-old bar manager wrote a message to a friend on the micro-
> blogging service, saying: "Free this week, for quick gossip/prep before I go
> and destroy America."

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projectramo
What if they claim they don't have one?

Or, I guess, what if they have two: one to show co-workers, TSA, and the like.
The second for their friends.

~~~
chrisfosterelli
> It will be an optional data field

Looks like it will not be mandatory.

I'm curious who would want/care to provide it willingly, if it was clearly an
optional field.

~~~
periodontal
If the extra initial scrutiny is perceived to streamline the process and avoid
further hassles, many will hand it over without giving it a second thought.

For example, many people have voluntarily submitted fingerprints in order to
enroll in TSA's PreCheck.

~~~
chrisfosterelli
That's a very good example, but on the other hand fingerprints aren't likely
to accidentally "incriminate" you.

Coming into the USA, if I saw that on a form my first instinct would be that
not providing it reduces the risk of accidentally getting flagged for
something ridiculous. I'd hate to be pulled aside for extra screening because
a tweet from 6 years ago included the word 'explosion' in it.

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gumby
It's voluntary so largely absurd. "Largely" since it's often unwise to take
advantage of such choices -- you're better off not exercising your right to
decline.

Any bad guy will just make a burner account. It need not even be obvious: a
person who mostly uses vKontakt can just make a legit, if empty Facebook
account.

~~~
advisedwang
My guess is such field won't be explicitly optional, it will just say
"Twitter:". People will assume it is mandatory and fill it in.

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fencepost
This is a complete and utter non-issue. If you're filling out paperwork for
the US government to "vet" you for something (admission, duration of stay,
whatever) then you might want to provide places where they can learn more
about you. That might be Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and the like where your
past history of advocating violent overthrow of governments may be relevant,
or it may be on other "social" sites like the StackExchange family where your
past history of hundreds of accepted answers on $Programming_Language may give
credibility to your request for a visa to enter for a conference.

Seriously, this is adding some lines to a form and doing it in the most
bureaucratic way possible because that's how governments do things.

~~~
janoc
You have obviously

a) not seen the ESTA and visa applications forms (the content and questions
are very similar) for traveling to the US.

b) not have one of these denied for an arbitrary and opaque reason (the
applicant is not told the reason).

c) not have had your personal information stolen and abused yet.

If Americans had to go through this sort of BS whenever they travel to Europe
there would be an uproar. But in reverse it is OK, because, obviously, the
people on the other side of the pond (which is the majority of who the ESTA
system applies to) are somehow more of a threat.

Mate, seriously ...

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zkirill
What happens if the social media account is set to private? Would the
traveller be asked to sign in during the border interview?

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Spoom
I suspect that this is put forward so that they can claim that nobody is
actually filling it out -- so they can subsequently require entrants to sign
in to a DHS Facebook app that extracts all your information.

