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New US visa rules will force foreign students to unlock social media profiles

(www.theguardian.com)
523 points sva_ | 10 comments | 18 Jun 25 23:11 UTC | HN request time: 0.981s | source | bottom
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testfoobar ◴[18 Jun 25 23:38 UTC] No.44314177[source]▶
Outside of just wanting privacy for its own sake, there are many, many reasons to keep social media profiles private: health privacy, sexual orientation privacy, relationship privacy, location privacy, financial privacy, etc.

“To facilitate this vetting, all applicants for F, M and J non-immigrant visas will be asked to adjust the privacy settings on all their social media profiles to ‘public’”, the official said.

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sneak ◴[19 Jun 25 03:06 UTC] No.44315092[source]▶
Another of the thousand reasons people should delete their Facebook and Instagram accounts.
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irjustin ◴[19 Jun 25 03:14 UTC] No.44315126[source]▶
Question: Does this create more problems?

i.e. "I don't have a social media"; "Sureeeee buddy"; "I really don't, I deleted it"; "We'll wait here until you do"

Some scary variation above.

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BLKNSLVR ◴[19 Jun 25 04:28 UTC] No.44315444[source]▶
I have vague but genuine concerns about that. I legitimately don't have any social media accounts. Does HN count? Well, none that can be casually associated to the name on my passport.
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1. GJim ◴[19 Jun 25 08:56 UTC] No.44316737[source]▶
> Does HN count?

Social media is where one shares ones social life (it's in the name!). Technical discussion forums are something entirely different.

Naturally, there is sometimes crossover (I'm thinking of a motorbike forum I frequent), but to suggest the likes of HN is social media is demonstrably false.

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2. Symbiote ◴[19 Jun 25 09:37 UTC] No.44316951[source]▶
"Github" is on the drop-down list of social media identifiers for a US ESTA (visa waiver) application.
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3. zarzavat ◴[19 Jun 25 10:48 UTC] No.44317354[source]▶
Under your definition Reddit and Twitter/X aren't social media either, since you're mostly interacting with strangers. I believe your definition doesn't reflect how the term is used.
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4. GJim ◴[19 Jun 25 13:12 UTC] No.44318398[source]▶
Bizarre response.

One can share ones social life with strangers!

In fact Reddit is a prime example of a site with crossover between technical discussion forums, social media forums and mixed ones.

5. 0manrho ◴[19 Jun 25 13:36 UTC] No.44318568[source]▶
Thats some semantic pedantic gymnastics. Even if you could persuade me to agree with you (and I very much do not) it does not matter. The only definition that matters here is the governments, and they LOVE overreach.
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6. GJim ◴[19 Jun 25 20:42 UTC] No.44322356[source]▶
> Thats some semantic pedantic gymnastics.

Ummmm. No. It's a statement of fact.

> The only definition that matters here is the governments,

No. It's the courts.

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7. lcnPylGDnU4H9OF ◴[19 Jun 25 23:08 UTC] No.44323352[source]▶
This is really not a convincing argument. Plenty of people put social information in their profile on this forum; there is clearly some social aspect to commenting and I’d argue the social aspect is the reason to comment and read comments. There are comments that are automatically more interesting to read because of the name in front of it.

> demonstrably false

Surely not “demonstrably” false. How would you demonstrate it? You may believe that it’s not social media but there’s no reason for you to think I should not believe it is social media.

8. GJim ◴[20 Jun 25 09:46 UTC] No.44326108[source]▶
Saying that Github is social media (!) does not make it true!
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9. Symbiote ◴[20 Jun 25 17:57 UTC] No.44330195{3}[source]▶
It makes it social media for American law regarding visas, which is the relevant context here.
10. ◴[26 Jun 25 20:06 UTC] No.44390785{3}[source]▶