On December 10, 2025, the Department of Homeland Security and the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) requested the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to review and approve the Paper Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA).  

The goal of this is to take extra precautions on who they allow to come into the country and to make sure they don’t pose threats. They also have been doing this to ensure that the people who apply for visas are who they claim to be with this they will be requiring pictures on their applications. The current problem that many people have with it is that they are trying to get more personal information than was required before.

The new protocol they have requested will begin to require are people’s activity on social media, their email accounts that have been used for the past 10 years, addresses of immediate family members, IP addresses and even meta data. This has led to many people being unhappy and claiming it is just an invasion of privacy rather than a means to keep the citizens safe. 

This issue is currently not open for all countries the main ones currently are Australia, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Japan. Those countries named are allies with the United States and are the ones that are going to be able to get this opportunity while they travel into the United States this way instead of a visa. 

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection have explained that they are basing the requirements with President Trumps executive order, “to protect its citizens from aliens who intend to commit terrorist attacks, threaten our national security, espouse hateful ideology, or otherwise exploit the immigration laws for malevolent purposes.”  

If you have ever posted anything that could be deemed as “hateful towards the United States” you could get denied entry, but they have not yet released what would qualify as hateful. They also have not explained it too much in detail to the public yet because it is still working in progress and so that citizens can put their input in.  

Sources: NPR, public inspection federal register, thetravel.com