The Department of Homeland Security has said that three pilot programs designed specifically to incorporate “appropriate” social media reviews into its vetting process were launched in the past year and the department is looking at other ways to use social media posts.
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The San Bernardino shooting has once again brought immigration to the fore of what has become a fierce political debate in the US.
That statement directly contradicts a claim made by a former government official, who told ABC News that social media postings of applicants are, as a matter of policy, not checked due to civil liberties concerns.
The U.S. authorities may impose tighter scrutiny of visa-seekers’ social media accounts following revelations in that one of many San Bernardino attackers mentioned violence before she was allowed in to the country. Investigators were also examining the couple’s money trail, which they say leads outside the United States.
“Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., demanded Sunday that the USA immediately initiate a program that would check the social media sites of those admitted on visas”.
One current and one former senior counter-terrorism official confirmed Cohen’s account about the refusal of DHS to change its policy about the public social media posts of all foreign applicants.
Though it does not appear the hard drive was found in the lake, investigators have another means of gathering data from the drive: Internet service providers can retrieve months of records of Internet activity linked to the IP address associated with the killers, the law enforcement source said.
Whatever the case, Malik and her husband armed themselves with high-powered rifles – purchased by an acquaintance, it was reported Saturday – and explosive devices, then murdered innocent Americans.
Not one of those screenings would have probably assessed the social media action of Malik as a result of secret U.S. policy forbidding security officials from reviewing social media action of would be immigrants, based on ABC News.
As we wrote last week, Federal Bureau of Investigation officials said after the attack that Malik and Farook “were radicalized and for quite some time”. The date that these types of reviews began is not clear, but it was after Malik was considered, the source said. We have a number of tools from which we draw this information. He underscored the importance of the State Department’s review of the visa process for assuring that a similar tragedy does not occur.
“If we don’t look and don’t review, we don’t know”, he said.
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More than 90 percent of hiring managers in the United States check job candidates through social media, according to some surveys.
