This proposal has popped up in the past, and it has been suggested long before Donald Trump became President of the USA, but it now looks like that it may actually happen. The Guardian is quoting a Wall Street Journal story that visitors from 38 countries that participate in the US Visa Waiver Program would be required to hand over mobile phone contacts, social media passwords and financial data as part of the “Extreme Vetting” proposals that are being floated by the Trump Administration. The idea is that this will be used to figure out if a visitor is up to no good.
Here’s why this is not going to work in my opinion. Nobody who is up to no good is going to serve up that information. Nor are they going to make it easy enough to find. Think fake social media handles, burner phones and the like. Not to mention that they’ll leave electronic devices at home. Thus leaving border guards with nothing to search. Plus how does a border agent quickly figure out if you’re a threat when US airports have lineups of people coming into their country if they now have troll your Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts? True, there are some details missing here, but It seems incredibly cumbersome, fraught with judicial over-reach, and more to the point, I am not sure what will actually get accomplished by this. As in, will a single “bad dude” get caught by this policy?
One other point. Tourism is a huge economic driver for the US. According to my favorite search engine, it accounted for $1.6 trillion in economic output in 2015. Proposals like this will likely have the effect of driving those dollars away from the US. I’m not sure that is what the folks behind this plan had in mind when they came up with it. But it’s not going to help them get tourists. Previous tweaks to US border rules have resulted in Canadians deciding to avoid travel to the US because of stories of Canadian citizens being denied entry to the US and questioned about their faith. That’s led to school boards and even the Girl Guides of Canada banning trips to the US for fear that all those on such a trip will not be treated equally. This latest move is likely to add to this and the number of people who plan to avoid the USA is about to skyrocket as this idea seems way over the top.
What are your thoughts? Is America doing the right thing or not? Are you going to avoid travel to the US because of this? Please leave a comment below and share your thoughts?
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This entry was posted on April 5, 2017 at 8:00 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Travel, USA. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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“Extreme Vetting” Proposal Would Require Some Visitors To US To Share Contacts & Social Media Passwords
This proposal has popped up in the past, and it has been suggested long before Donald Trump became President of the USA, but it now looks like that it may actually happen. The Guardian is quoting a Wall Street Journal story that visitors from 38 countries that participate in the US Visa Waiver Program would be required to hand over mobile phone contacts, social media passwords and financial data as part of the “Extreme Vetting” proposals that are being floated by the Trump Administration. The idea is that this will be used to figure out if a visitor is up to no good.
Here’s why this is not going to work in my opinion. Nobody who is up to no good is going to serve up that information. Nor are they going to make it easy enough to find. Think fake social media handles, burner phones and the like. Not to mention that they’ll leave electronic devices at home. Thus leaving border guards with nothing to search. Plus how does a border agent quickly figure out if you’re a threat when US airports have lineups of people coming into their country if they now have troll your Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram accounts? True, there are some details missing here, but It seems incredibly cumbersome, fraught with judicial over-reach, and more to the point, I am not sure what will actually get accomplished by this. As in, will a single “bad dude” get caught by this policy?
One other point. Tourism is a huge economic driver for the US. According to my favorite search engine, it accounted for $1.6 trillion in economic output in 2015. Proposals like this will likely have the effect of driving those dollars away from the US. I’m not sure that is what the folks behind this plan had in mind when they came up with it. But it’s not going to help them get tourists. Previous tweaks to US border rules have resulted in Canadians deciding to avoid travel to the US because of stories of Canadian citizens being denied entry to the US and questioned about their faith. That’s led to school boards and even the Girl Guides of Canada banning trips to the US for fear that all those on such a trip will not be treated equally. This latest move is likely to add to this and the number of people who plan to avoid the USA is about to skyrocket as this idea seems way over the top.
What are your thoughts? Is America doing the right thing or not? Are you going to avoid travel to the US because of this? Please leave a comment below and share your thoughts?
Share this:
Like this:
Related
This entry was posted on April 5, 2017 at 8:00 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Travel, USA. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.