Nope, they barely even talk to you. I've crossed the Chinese border literally hundreds of times, mostly from Hong Kong. They usually don’t ask anything and if they do, it's just a basic "What's the purpose of your visit?" I’ve never had my bags searched or been sent to secondary inspection. Even crossed with one barefoot once (long story) and wasn't even asked about it.
In contrast, my worst border experiences have been in the U.S. and Canada (and I've traveled to over 30 countries).
In the US, I was nearly denied entry at SFO while on a valid TN visa simply because I didn't have a business card with me. The officer also referred to my wife as a "Chinese bitch" - within earshot (this happened during the Obama years). I had to let them handle my phone a bit to verify work emails, etc. But they didn't really search through it beyond that.
In Canada, I was sent to secondary inspection, had my bags searched, and was asked to show the photos on my phone. I was questioned for over an hour and they never told me the reason for it. It felt like they suspected me of smuggling drugs because the guy kept asking me what I had for breakfast... I'm Canadian btw and don't do drugs.
> They usually don’t ask anything and if they do, it's just a basic "What's the purpose of your visit?" I’ve never had my bags searched or been sent to secondary inspection.
FWIW in the US you usually also don't get asked more than that (not including questions on you Visa / visa exempt application) and searches are not standard procedure that everyone goes through.
They have never gone through my phone, although I guess if they wanted to nothing would stop them. The immigration agents don't even ask questions most of the time, heck, I don't even here them speak on most of my entries.
They don't ask any questions when you leave either, unless you overstayed your visa. In that case, they just ask you to come back with money to pay the fine. It's actually kind of funny: they don’t detain you or anything, just politely tell you to find an ATM and come back when you have cash to pay the fine.
This happened to my wife in Japan when we were trying to board the second try of our flight cancelled the day before. I told them "we don't have any Japanese money, and anyways, this was Delta's fault, so just get them to pay." We sat around for a half hour while they got Delta to pay her fine.
Do they not have ATMs at the airport? Seems unnecessarily risky to not just take the opportunity to pay the fine as quickly as possible - visa overstays can easily end in detention in many (especially Asian) countries and not just in the US.
And while the delay might have been the airline's fault and possibly you could have a civil claim against them for damages incurred it is still your responsibility to have a valid Visa and not overstay it and also your responsibility to pay any fines for it (which you may or may not be able to get reimbursed).
They should have taken care of this when they brought us back into Japan after the flight was canceled (they didn’t catch it when the re admitted her into Japan and the visa was invalidated on her way out since it was single entry, and the flight was to the states so most passengers were visa waiver). And anyways, they were so apologetic that I didn’t really doubt that the Delta Japanese ground crew would just take care of it.
The really sad story is that the flight was canceled a second time after that drama, and we were really feeling a lot of emotions over that debacle. Suffice it to say we’ve sworn off delta for awhile.
I don't know about about the specifics in China but amnesty for short overstays if they don't catch you on the street for it but you are actually trying to leave is not uncommon in the region. Longer overstays especially when not self-reported can easily end in detention though.
This was a paper work snafu, she was re-admitted into Japan by immigration officers after her visa was invalidated (because it was single entry and they cancelled the flight after we went through emigration). So it’s not like the violation was intentional or even avoidable.
China gives you a ten year unlimited entry visa, so it’s pretty hard to screw that up.
To be fair something that makes the news isn't necessarily indicative of the median experience either. If US and China both looked through 0.1% of traveler's phones, that'd be both compatible with horror stories making the news, and widespread anecdotes of "weird, never happened to me".
Where does it say that? Your source only says profiles need to be public
Moreover your description is slightly misleading because it only applies to "all applicants for F, M, and J nonimmigrant visas", which notably excludes tourism visas (B-2). The visas listed all seem to be academic related, presumably because the administration wants to crack down on woke ivy league students or whatever.
> "THE US EMBASSY in Dublin is tightening its visa requirements, saying that future applicants looking to visit the country will be required to divulge “all social media usernames or handles of every platform they have used from the last five years” on their visa application form."
Not when I went there. I needed a lot of paperwork for the visa at their embassy, and to surrender my passport for a few days, and a signed statement from my employer that I was not a journalist of any kind.
I got in. I was sent to some form of secondary screening, but they apparently couldn't find anybody who could speak English, so they just let me in.
Edit: I'm from a rich western country, in case it matters for anybody getting an understanding of who gets treated what way.
I did get a weird interaction in China fwiw. Let in fine but at one point i sat down to have lunch at a restaurant and 2 English speaking police officers sat down at my table and started asking if i was doing well etc. I just chatted making sure not to say anything negative about the government, talked about tourist sites and they left, they were fine, no issue. Just a weird interaction.
I guess it's a routine part of China's paranoia. They definitely do do weird things to check if tourists are causing trouble in some way i guess. I imagine that sort of interaction alone would scare off trouble makers and it's probably effective honestly.
Contrary to common belief, it's fine to say negative things about the government in this case, as long as you are not Chinese. They may argue with you (or laugh at you for some even weirder reasons) and you both may have an unpleasant conversation, but that's it.
> I guess it's a routine part of China's paranoia. They definitely do do weird things to check if tourists are causing trouble in some way i guess.
I’m guessing you actually did something suspicious or illegal without realizing it.
A common and simple example of this is taking pictures where it’s technically forbidden — airports, military buildings (these aren’t always obvious to visitors), religious sites, etc.
Another example would be interacting with a person of interest. This could be a Chinese person that they are watching, or a foreigner that they are keeping tabs on (e.g., embassy staff that they suspect of being an agent).
As a tourist, you probably wouldn’t notice these things or even be aware that they are a red flag.
I don't recall them asking for any social media at any point. But I don't have Facebook, tiktok, instagram, snapchat, grinder, myspace, or other muggle social media.
I of course wouldn't know if they tried to find my profiles.
BTW not having profiles on mugg^W normie social media may be sometimes considered a red flag by itself, so I keep e.g. a reasonable Facebook profile, without posting anything.
YMMV but at least for US entry just listing GitHub (it's one of the options in the ESTA application) hasn't caused any "random" inspections for me so I'm not sure how much of a flag it really is on its own.
Not in my experience. They check your passport and your visa. Didn’t go anywhere near my phone.
I wouldn’t be sharing Winnie the Pooh memes on WeChat though.
I'm sure it happens, and they also don't systematically check phones when entering the US, it's probably exceedingly rare and I've never witnessed it despite travelling to the US 3 times since Trump got elected.
Case in point this is only the 2nd story ever to come out about someone being detained / refused entry for content that was on their phone since Trump is president.
