Does the U.S. government follow you on Twitter and Facebook? Maybe it will soon.
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) — the agency in charge of international travel and immigration to the U.S. — want to start asking visitors entering the United States to turn over the usernames on their social media accounts such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Those accounts are often highly personal. They’re full of inside jokes, political commentary, rants and raves, and cat videos. Or dog videos. Whatever gets you through the day. It’s really easy for people to take this information out of context or to misunderstand it. It’s happened before.
The choice to hand over this information is supposed to be voluntary (for now). But the process to enter the U.S. is confusing, and it’s likely that most visitors will fill out the card completely rather than risk additional questions from intimidating, uniformed officers — the same officers who will decide which of your jokes are funny and which ones make you a security risk.
Weigh in on the CBP's proposal by taking our short survey below. We’ll file your responses directly with the agency. There are just 12 questions and a space for you to write your own comments at the end of the survey.