IRANIAN THIRD COUNTRY NATIONAL VISA APPLICANT FRAUD

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 STATE 128423

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: CVIS KFRD CMGT
SUBJECT: IRANIAN THIRD COUNTRY NATIONAL VISA APPLICANT FRAUD
PREVENTION CONFERENCE


1. SUMMARY. An Office of Fraud Prevention Programs (CA/FPP)-hosted
conference focusing on fraud issues and consular processing for
Iranian citizens, held in Washington, D.C., from September 29 through
October 1, brought together 16 consular officers from top
Iranian-national visa processing posts with representatives from the
Department of State and other U.S. Government agencies. Participants
discussed topics unique to the processing of Iranian cases, such as
Iranian document security features and issuance procedures, Iranian
naming conventions, Security Advisory Opinion (SAO) processing, and
Iranian sanctions.


2. In addition to bolstering consular knowledge of fraud prevention
resources, the conference aimed to standardize the processing of
Iranian cases and improve the security of the process by establishing
consistent baselines for identity and relationship indicators,
providing improved customer service to bona fide applicants, and
eliminating real or perceived advantages of applying at one post over
another. This cable summarizes many of these resources and
recommendations, including implementation of some standard operating
procedures for handling Iranian cases. END SUMMARY.

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Uniform Data Entry for Iranian NIV Applicants
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3. Uniform data entry of Iranian applicants is vital in preventing
visa shopping and maximizing our automated screening resources. When
entering Iranian applicant data in nonimmigrant visa (NIV) and
immigrant visa (IV) cases, consular officers should collect and
include the applicant's full ten-digit national ID number instead of
the old seven-digit number found on the shenasnameh, or Iranian birth
certificate. This ten-digit ID can be found in Farsi on newer
passports and in English and Farsi on the new national ID card
(kart-de-melli). (Note: A Farsi/English number translation guide is
available on CA/FPP's Intranet website under "Conferences" for those
posts without Farsi-speaking staff.) In addition, as Iranian women
rarely use their husbands' surnames, consular officers should include
the husband's surname in the alias field for all married female
applicants as an important fraud prevention screening technique. For
more information on Iranian names, please see 9 FAM Appendix F 518.

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Assistance with Farsi Documents
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4. CA/FPP has posted a number of guides to official Iranian
documents, Iranian naming conventions, and much more on the CA/FPP
Intranet website. The website should be the first resource for posts
not familiar with Iranian documents and norms. However, even posts
that process significant numbers of Iranian applicants have varying
levels of access to Farsi speaking officers or LES staff. Posts with
greater Farsi-related resources may be called upon to provide
appropriate assistance for posts without Farsi-speaking officers or
LES staff. If your post needs limited assistance understanding and
evaluating Iranian documents, please coordinate that request through
your CA/FPP post liaison officer who will help find another post or
U.S. Government expert who can assist you. If you believe your post
has a sustained demand for this type of expertise, consular managers
should raise the matter with their regional management analyst in
CA/EX and post liaison officer in the Visa Office's Post Liaison
Division (CA/VO/F/P).

STATE 00128423 002 OF 004


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Inclusion of Iranian Fraud Trends in Fraud Summaries of Designated
Processing Posts
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5. CA/FPP has undertaken a new initiative to compile and maintain an
Iranian Country Fraud Summary to be posted on our Intranet website.
Iranian-designated processing posts are requested to assist in this
endeavor by reporting specifically on trends in Iranian NIV-, IV-,
and American Citizen Services (ACS)-related cases in their
semi-annual fraud summaries. CA/FPP will then extract and
consolidate Iranian-related content into a comprehensive fraud
summary which will be available to all posts and appropriate USG
partners. The first edition of the fraud summary will be posted
soon.

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B2 Visas for Non-Business Travel and Sanctions
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6. Consular officers processing Iranian B1/B2 (visitor for business
or pleasure) applicants should be alert to the potential for abuse of
visa status for the purposes of violating sanctions, particularly for
Iranian-resident business owners or executives. Although it is
impossible to completely control an applicant's activities once they
have entered the United States, consular officers may wish to
consider issuing only B2 visas to applicants traveling for personal
reasons. While this will not completely prevent them from engaging
in unauthorized activities, it will more correctly communicate to
Department of Homeland Security Customs and Border Protection
(DHS/CBP) officers and other DHS entities the applicant's stated
purpose of travel at the time of visa application. For more
information on what business activities are appropriate for Iranian
citizens on B1 visas and what activities require waivers from the
Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC),
consular officers should consult 9 FAM 40.31 N5.1-2 or
www.treas.gov/offices
/enforcement/ofac/programs/iran/iran.shtml. CA/FPP also has
information on OFAC's Sanctions Enforcement Program on the Iran Fraud
Prevention Conference page on its Intranet website.

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Conveying 3B Visa Refusals
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8. Per 9 FAM 40.4 N5.1, if an alien is refused a visa on security
grounds, consular officers must restrict the statement of the reasons
for the refusal to a reference to the law or to the Code of Federal
Regulations. Posts are not required to, nor should they, release
information of a confidential nature to the interested party. In the
case of applicants who are not regularly resident in the post's
consular district and who are refused as the result of an SAO
response, posts are permitted to inform the applicant on the phone
(instead of requiring another personal appearance) and via e-mail;
however, posts must ensure that applicants are informed by both
means. Posts should scan a copy of the e-mail correspondence into
the NIV record for purposes of record-keeping. This exception is
made to avoid imposing significant travel costs upon the applicant
solely for the purpose of refusing a visa in person. This is an
exceptional circumstance and is not permitted for locally resident
Iranian applicants or for applicants of any other nationality
regardless of place of residence.


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STATE 00128423 003 OF 004


Personal Appearance for Passport Pass-Back
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9. Currently, there are no specific regulations requiring visa-ed
passports to be collected in person by the bearer. Posts are
encouraged to consider more liberal options for passport pass-back
for applicants resident in Iran. Posts may wish to consider allowing
friends and family members who present a signed letter of
authorization from the bearer to collect the passport. Posts may
also wish consider using a secure courier service to deliver
passports in-country (i.e., to a local hotel where the applicant is
staying) to eliminate the need for the applicant to travel personally
to the consular section to collect his or her passport. Questions on
what methods are most appropriate for your country and applicant pool
should be referred to CA/VO/F/P and to the appropriate CA/EX post
management analyst.

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Overseas Document Verification
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10. On occasion, consular staff may receive requests for
verification of Iranian documents in connection with an application
for immigration benefits, or a review of immigration status from DHS
or other U.S. Government agencies. Because our overseas missions do
not have a reliable means for verifying documents issued in Iran,
consular staff should generally decline to accept these requests. If
post determines it appropriate to review documents and obvious fraud
indicators are evident, consular officers can and should highlight
areas in which the document differs from other similar documents
encountered at post. Officers should make clear in their response,
however, that the analysis of the document is based solely on post
experience and that post can neither definitively confirm nor refute
the document's veracity. Posts that have questions about what is
appropriate in a specific case should consult with their CA/FPP post
liaison officer.

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Managing Appointment Systems for Iranian Applicants
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11. Several conference attendees expressed concerns about abuse of
appointment systems for Iranian applicants, particularly Iranian
travel agents, resulting in high no-show rates. One best practice
that was discussed during the conference was to publish the day and
time that appointments would be released so that the general public
would have an equal chance at scheduling an appointment time when
made available without having to work through a third party. Another
post combats this problem by not allowing canceled appointments to be
rescheduled, discouraging third parties and travel agencies from
booking appointments using "dummy" data and then later canceling and
immediately rebooking once they have sold the slot to an individual
applicant. For posts that have more severe problems with appointment
fraud and misuse, they should work with their CA/EX, CA/VO, and
CA/FPP post liaison officers to identify the best solution.

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Conclusion
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12. CA/FPP sincerely appreciates the excellent participation by
posts and presenters during this important conference. In an effort
to make conference topics available to a wide audience, CA/FPP has
established an Iran Fraud Prevention Conference webpage on our
Intranet site at the following URL: http://intranet
.ca.state.gov/ fraud/fpu/FPP%20Conferences/23262.aspx, and also on

STATE 00128423 004 OF 004


our classified Intranet website. These sites provide useful
resources on Iranian visa processing, naming customs, Department of
Treasury-OFAC sanctions, asylum and refugee processing, trends in
alien smuggling, and more. We continually strive to provide posts
with as much information as possible to facilitate processing of
these applications in a secure and customer-service oriented fashion.
Posts are encouraged to contribute to their CA/FPP liaison officer
for posting additional helpful resources or reporting on Iran-related
topics.
CLINTON