How should the USA balance security & access? Is this insane? Reasonable? Unenforceable? Tourism suicide? Insular? A mistake?

Question

The United States could begin requiring visitors from countries on the visa waiver program to provide up to five years of their social media history, according to a U. S. Customs and Border Protection proposal posted to the Federal Register to be officially published Wednesday.

There are dozens of countries on the visa waiver program list, including many European nations, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, Japan, Brunei, Singapore, Qatar, Israel and Chile.

The proposal suggests adding social media as a “mandatory data element” for an Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) application.

Applicants would also have to provide additional information “when feasible,” according to the proposal. The list includes telephone numbers used in the past five years; email addresses used in the past 10 years; IP addresses and metadata from electronically submitted photos; and biometrics, including facial, fingerprint, DNA and iris data.

It would also require applicants to provide information about their family members, including names, telephone numbers, dates of birth, places of birth and residences.

msc545 · Accepted Answer

Trump wants to make sure that nobody said anything negative about him on social media before they visit here. Quite honestly, anybody who wants to visit here is either stupid or not paying attention. I would know more come to visit here than I would visit in a country where terrorism was the order of the day and that terrorism was focused against Americans. The only people that Trump and his ilk want here are white Europeans and preferably the rich ones.

RedInnocent69 · Accepted Answer

Most of what the US does lately comes across as insane

egan3141 · Answer

As someone with no meaningful social media (this is now the closest thing I have and I made it yesterday), I would be pissed off if a place I wanted to go required this, but lots of things piss me off, so that doesn't mean much.

To get to the actual questions

HOW
If we truly want to stop bad things from happening, then we must deliver VERY harsh punishments to bad things. In the early days of America, ALL felonies had the potential to be punished by execution and commonly were. (Don't get me wrong, what is and isn't a felony would need greatly reworked at this point because so many felonies are not remotely crimes deserving death). As for people that are willing to suicide to accomplish their attack on America: IF they care about their family/country, then punishing their family/country is the only way. For those that don't even care about that, you can't stop them. Period. SOME people might get stopped because they were sloppy, but if someone is committed enough and careful enough, NOTHING will be able to stop them. So, outside of just enforcing current laws (and making punishments harsher), I don't think there is a meaningful deterrent beyond inspecting all that they bring here and/or restricting what a non-citizen can do while here.

INSANE?
I would think an insane idea is one without reason. In that case, this is not insane. There is a very clear reason why this is being done.

REASONABLE?
That one is harder to answer. If our country, or rather our people, our in as much danger as the internet portrays from people that aren't even citizens of our country, then something DOES need to be done. The question is, is it really that bad, and what else could be done? Given what our government is likely to do, I think this is "reasonable". Reasonable in quotes because it is likely for a government to take this action. Governments love invading peoples' lives. As for actions that are reasonable without factoring in that it is a government... depends on what you mean by reasonable. Reasonable if you want to keep tourism? Reasonable if you want to be polite? Reasonable in regards to something else?

UNENFORCEABLE?
Because they are not citizens, it becomes a gray area. At times, we say all humans, citizen or otherwise, get the same rights as citizens. At other times, we don't. So the question becomes Do non-citizens have a right privacy (that only stops some things, as what you put online isn't private). For everything else, such as your email address, phone #, etc... these aren't really protected, so yes, it is very enforceable

TOURISM SUICIDE?
Depends what is actually required, when. Even we Americans give up our phone numbers, address, date of birth, and so much more for so much less. Just making an account here requires a birth day. Do you really think someone is gonna decide to tour elsewhere just because they have to give away information they commonly give away anyway? Now, if the parts that aren't kept in our memory, and thus immediately able to be given out, are required very often, THAT could hurt tourism quite a bit. So... depends

INSULAR?
Like, isolating? No. This only changes the requirements on 1 form of a foreigner entering America. Just 1. All others are unaffected by this change. Isolation would require every form being greatly reduced.

MISTAKE?
This is the most difficult one to answer. Even if it is a mistake, it could still be a yes or no to all other questions. A mistake is usually something where a goal you had was unknowingly hurt my your choice. This does not have just 1 goal, so maybe? probably? But is any choice a government makes not a mistake in some way?

WindAtMyBack · Answer

At this point it's just a proposal which are a dime a dozen. Although I've been hearing about this for quite some time.

How would this be enforced? The person could just say they don't use any social media, and in many cases it would be true.

As far as I know there has always been some kind of morality clause. It's just a matter of enforcing it. Other countries do similar. Hell, smoking a few joints when you were 19 might keep you out of some countries. But again, how do you enforce it?

NaultD · Answer

They hate there own offspring for being different. Why would they care about another person ever? Why would we elect them to be our representative? They are bitter awful people.

boundless · Answer

i guess you'll just have to move to South Africa to try to carry out your plans. Your movement has been canceled in America.

exitseven · Answer

It is next to impossible to keep a country the size of the US completely but there are things that could be done to decrease the risk of terrorism.

After the attack in the World Trade Center serious measures at airports across the country were implemented to help prevent another incident. We now have technology tht was not available 25 years ago so maybe it is time to revise the security protocols in place concerning tourism.

Anonymous · Answer

Hard to say. A father & son white Christian nationalists just shot up a jewish celebration on Bondi beach in Australia but were stopped by a Muslim shopkeeper. Clearly shows how Trump and white Christian nationalists are the problem and stopping them is the key to combating antisemitism.

Likes2drive · Answer

Sounds a bit extreme, and I don’t even think I could even come up with all that if I had to , definitely going to lose a lot of tourism in the country and money if they start doing that

Pohjolan · Answer

I think getting a actual visa requires less paperwork.

Sal_Monella · Answer

Receipts?

How should the USA balance security & access? Is this insane? Reasonable? Unenforceable? Tourism suicide? Insular? A mistake?

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