From Dec 15, Your Social Media is Part of H-1B/H-4 Screening
Analytics India Magazine (C P Balasubramanyam)
The US Department of State has announced that beginning December 15, all H-1B visa applicants and their H-4 dependents will undergo a mandatory online presence review, extending a screening requirement that previously applied only to international students and exchange visitors.
To support this expansion, the department has directed applicants across the H-1B, H-4, F, M and J non-immigrant visa categories to set the privacy settings of all social-media accounts to “public.”
According to the announcement, the state department relies on “all available information” to identify visa applicants who may be inadmissible to the United States, including individuals who could pose threats to national security or public safety.
The department also said it already conducts online-presence reviews for F, M and J applicants and is now bringing H-1B and H-4 applicants under the same process.
Reiterating that “every visa adjudication is a national security decision,” the department emphasised that consular officers must confirm applicants do not intend to harm US interests and can credibly demonstrate eligibility for the visa category they are seeking.
It added that holding a US visa is “a privilege, not a right.”
Until now, the mandatory online-presence review applied only to F-1 and M-1 students and J-1 exchange visitors, categories that have been subject to enhanced digital-screening measures for several years.
For H-1B workers and H-4 dependents, consular officers could review publicly available online information at their discretion, but there was no universal, formal requirement.
Applicants were not instructed to make their social-media accounts public, and online-presence checks were not a standardised part of the adjudication process.
The US Citizenship and Immigration Services data shows that India overwhelmingly dominates H-1B approvals, accounting for 71% (283,397) of all 399,395 approved beneficiaries in FY 2024.
China follows at 11.7%, with other countries contributing only small single-digit shares.
Indian IT companies that were one of the largest beneficiaries of H-1B visas have been cutting down significantly on applications over the past few years.
Total petitions from eight leading firms, including Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, and Wipro dropped from 25,475 in 2022 to 14,319 in 2025, according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services.
The figures indicate a 44% drop in visa petitions by Indian IT firms over a four year period.
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