What exactly is the US Immigration Investigation looking for?

In order to ensure that only qualified applicants can get immigration benefits, USCIS has taken some measures in background security inspection to reduce risks. According to different kinds of immigration applications, the Immigration Bureau has a set of requirements for their security procedures. Generally, the Immigration Bureau takes the following three security measures, but reserves the right to conduct other security checks when necessary:

1. Immigration Management Review System: IBIS is a central organization, which combines several government agencies, including information processing, database and system integration, to cope with the crisis of national security, public safety and other law enforcement issues. USCIS can quickly confirm from these merged government departments whether all the information in the database has an impact on your immigration case judgment. The test results of IBIS are usually available immediately. In some cases, the information inspection of IBIS may require further investigation. All the questions of IBIS test must be answered from the original system before the results can be obtained.

2. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) fingerprint inspection: This inspection is applicable to many applicants. The examination provided information about the applicant's criminal background in the United States. Generally speaking, the FBI will forward the inspection results directly to the immigration office within 24 hours. If it is found to be the same as that in the fingerprint database of the FBI, the FBI will provide an electronic copy of the applicant's criminal history to the Immigration Bureau. In this case, the immigration officer will decide the impact on the immigration application according to the situation. Although the vast majority of applicants do not have the same fingerprint records in the FBI, 10% of the applicants were found to have criminal history (including violation of immigration regulations). If arrested or sentenced, the Immigration Bureau will ask the applicant to provide evidence of release notarized by the court. If the applicant has a record of being arrested, then the applicant should provide all the information at the time of application, so as to avoid being delayed, revoked or rejected by the immigration bureau because of misunderstanding of the criminal record. Even if the criminal record has been revoked or acquitted, it must be declared when applying for immigration.

3. FBI name check: FBI name check is something that many applicants must face. It is completely different from fingerprint inspection. It brings together cases of law enforcement agencies, administrative management, criminal offences, personnel departments and so on. Simple should get an initial response within two weeks. About 80% people easily passed the name check. The remaining 20% will take about six months. At least 1% people are subject to the fact that the name check of the FBI is still pending and it will take more than 6 months. Some of them are too complex and sensitive to be solved quickly. Even if the FBI provides the original reply to the Immigration Bureau, the name check will not be completed until the complete information is obtained and the qualification problem is solved.

For the vast majority of applicants, the above procedure allows the Immigration Bureau to quickly decide whether the immigration applicant is related to crime and security issues, and this procedure will not have any impact on most immigration cases. However, due to a large number of security checks conducted by the Immigration Bureau, and each applicant must undergo a thorough screening. So it is inevitable that some people will be delayed or delayed. The background investigation may be because the FBI or relevant departments have not made a final response to the investigation, or have already responded, but it needs further investigation or review by the Immigration Bureau and relevant departments.

Solving delayed cases is very time-consuming and laborious, and some cases may take months or even years to solve. Each regional office of the Immigration Bureau will regularly review the delayed cases to determine whether they have dispelled their doubts or can make a decision. However, the Immigration Department will not share with applicants or their lawyers their information about the type of record checking or the nature of the investigation. In our customer information, if it is "hit" by the immigration name check, most of it is "cold" and will not be cleared for a year or two. Lawyers, congressmen, etc. There is nothing we can do in the face of national security issues. Faced with this problem, the only thing they can do is to wait quietly until one day the immigration bureau suddenly released the security check. (