Final immigration report for the 54th Cosa

[Eðo Grischun]

Final immigration report for the 54th Cosa


Total number of immigration applications received by the Ministry during the 54th Cosa session and to date:  101

Of those 101, total number that went on to register an account on Wittenberg: 25

(22 of those 25 did so either exclusively on NewWitt or on both NewWitt and OldWitt,
while 3 registered on OldWitt but didn't migrate over to NewWitt)

Thus of the 101 applications received, 76 did not progress past the initial application stage.

Of those 76, the number of applications that would have gone ahead but the applicant just didn't go on to create a Witt account was 40.  And, of the same 76, the number of applications that were outright rejected by the Ministry was 36.

Those 36 rejected applications were by and large made by people who failed to pass the new "Pete Townsend" (who are you?) test.  This, as you may have noticed, is where the application form now asks applicants to provide a link to at least one social media profile for the Ministry to verify that the applicant is who they say they are.  In all cases where this test was failed, the applicant provided links to social media accounts that were clearly fraudulent (usually a brand new account with no post history or friends list). 

This is rather notable, in my opinion.  In the past, I was of the view that immigration requirements should be loose and that the process of immigration should contain zero entry barriers.  You will note my words during the election campaign for the 54th Cosa where I called for immigration to be completely open to any and all, as well as the numerous times in the past where I stood against introducing requirements for identity checks.  However, since implementing the 'Pete Townsend test', the findings have changed my mind.  It is quite clear to me that a considerable number of applicants are completely comfortable in attempting to obtain Talossan citizenship while concealing their true identity.  Now, I am totally sympathetic to issues of privacy, which is why in implementing this identity check it is made clear to the applicant that the link or links provided are not stored in any database without consent and, further, we seek affirmative consent on whether the applicant wishes the links to be included on their public immigration profile or not.  The thresholds of this ID test are very, very low.  Yet, many choose to attempt to game it.

A further thought on this is that it can't simply be a new problem.  This must always have been happening in the past but going unnoticed. I surmise, then, that a large number of previous applicants over many years may have been made using false names.  To date, only one such case of a fully naturalised citizen having done this has been discovered (not counting the ESB affair), which leads me to think that almost all of the times that this has happened will have been with prospective citizens that never achieved naturalisation.

Finally, on this subset, a handful of the 36 rejected were nuisance applications or spam bots.  The exact breakdown of these I don't have data for as they were deleted upon receipt, but it was single digits (around half a dozen-ish).  I note that the number of spam applications has fallen drastically over time though, with them occurring in a short space of time over January and February with zero having been found in the months since.

As for the 40 applicants that did not go on to register a Witt account, I cannot provide any indication as to why that happened.  In those cases, the applicant did pass the 'Pete Townsend Test', but simply failed to take action.  We can only guess and speculate as to the reasons why.

As for the 25 that did create Witt accounts, 5 were naturalised.  In many cases, the applicants either didn't post at all or when they did they only posted a small number of times before dropping off.  In all other cases, the applicant met the basic requirements set out to achieve full citizenship, but no petition was made to the Chancery by an existing citizen.  The exact breakdown of data for these cases has not been recorded, but can be found by viewing each individual thread within the immigration sub-forum.  And, finally, of course, a small number of these 25 cases are still active applications.

[Miestră Schivă, UrN]

Thank you so much, Senator!

I guess this blows the "FreeDems-led government depresses immigration" narrative out the window. The problem is not the quantity of new applicants, but the quality; actually, this can be said for active citizens as well.

[Eðo Grischun]

Thank you so much, Senator!

I guess this blows the "FreeDems-led government depresses immigration" narrative out the window. The problem is not the quantity of new applicants, but the quality; actually, this can be said for active citizens as well.

Indeed.

Immigration application stats at the first point of action are actually very good.
All the various steps in the process does weed that high number down to a low naturalisation figure, but there's a lot of merit behind "better fewer, but better".

[esbornatfiglheu]

For the 36 that failed the Townsend, did they seem to be bots?  Or were they human individuals insofar as you could ascertain?

[Eðo Grischun]

For the 36 that failed the Townsend, did they seem to be bots?  Or were they human individuals insofar as you could ascertain?

That's a good question and it may have accidentally answered why this here happened:

"I note that the number of spam applications has fallen drastically over time though, with them occurring in a short space of time over January and February with zero having been found in the months since."

The immigration form changed to include Townsend after February, and those changes would be near impossible for a rudimentary bot to pass.  The applicant now needs to fill out a field with a hyperlink to a social media profile.  I guess that it's not impossible for a bot to do, but it would need to be very clever to be able to fill out the hyperlink box in the correct context, as well as clicking to confirm several qualifying statements.  So, by implementing Townsend we may have inadvertently solved the spambot issue that we were having earlier on.

To answer your actual question though, as far as I could tell the applications in question were made by real people.  The form won't send to me if at least one social media link hasn't been provided and, as already mentioned, this leads me to believe all of the form receipts were sent to me by a human.

The reasons for failure were either (i) that the social media account was in the correct name, but was clearly a brand new account with little to no friends or posts, leading me to conclude that the social media account was created solely for the purpose of completing the citizenship application, or (ii) the social media account provided did not match any of the names given on the application.

I should add that in cases where the element of doubt was present I would shoot off an email to the applicant to try and find out more info.  A small number of those instances did lead to the application eventually going ahead.