Immigration [citizenship] fraud makes us vulnerable: Hassan

Farzana Hassan on the OAG report on citizenship fraud (Gaps in Ottawa’s detection of citizenship fraud, auditor finds):

According to a Sun story Tuesday: “Michael Ferguson’s report uncovered instances of people with serious criminal records and others using potentially phony addresses, among those who managed to secure Canadian citizenship, thanks to holes throughout not just the Immigration Department but the RCMP and Canada Border Services Agency as well.”

Of course, we should expect some mistakes in any government department, but it is reasonable to ask how widespread is the failure to weed out undesirable people from entering Canada and what will be done to solve the problem?

Immigration Minister John McCallum reacted to the report by saying the Liberal government is already looking into the issue and trying to address the problem. But the public needs something more tangible from the government than a formulaic response.

Andrew Griffith, author of the book, Multiculturalism in Canada: Evidence and Anecdote, writes in his blog entitled Multicultural Meanderings, “One of the lasting legacies of the Conservative government was increased attention to the integrity of the program, beyond the issues identified in the OAG report (e.g., rotating citizenship test questions, more rigorous and consistent language assessment, and the integrity measures of C-24).”

The Trudeau government has retained many of these controls, but the technology solutions enabling effective oversight need to be refined.

Griffith is convinced the problem is not too widespread, but the current high reliance on manual data entry and human triggered searches is so critically prone to error that a simple spelling mistake can cause a failure in the system.

Automated alerts need to be in place. Electronic scanning for data accuracy and compatibility between security organizations needs to be a priority.

The stakes are high, and the current system has too many holes to provide the kind of assurance to which Canadians are entitled.

Despite the optimism of observers like Griffith, it is clear the system needs a thorough overhaul, especially when immigration in many cases is being aggressively and fraudulently pursued in terror-exporting countries like Pakistan and others in the Middle East.

Human error will continue to play a role in any system. But in an electronic age, automatic identification technology and smart systems that use leading-edge applications can significantly reduce mistakes.

Canadians deserve to know they are safe from people with criminal records and jihadi mindsets

Source: Immigration fraud makes us vulnerable | HASSAN | Columnists | Opinion | Toronto