DHS/USCIS/PIA-076 Continuous Immigration Vetting

In 2017, through an effort known as Continuous Immigration Vetting (CIV), U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) began vetting information from certain immigration benefit applications throughout the entire application adjudication period as new information is received, rather than only performing point-in-time checks, to further enhance the agency’s ability to identify national security concerns. CIV is an event-based1 vetting tool that automates and streamlines the process of notifying USCIS of potential derogatory information in Government databases that may relate to individuals in USCIS systems, as new information is discovered. USCIS is now incrementally expanding CIV to encompass screening and vetting immigrant and nonimmigrant applications and petitions throughout the duration of the benefit or status, until the individual becomes a naturalized U.S. Citizen. USCIS is publishing this Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) to provide greater transparency into the CIV initiative and to assess the impact of automating event-based vetting for individuals from the time of an initial benefit filing up until naturalization.

February 2019

Associated SORN(s):

• DHS/USCIS/ICE/CBP-001 Alien File, Index, and National File Tracking System of Records
• DHS/USCIS-006 Fraud Detection and National Security Records
• DHS/USCIS-018 Immigration Biometric and Background Check
• DHS/CBP-006 Automated Targeting System
• DHS/CBP-011 TECS