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Comment by zeroonetwothree | Hacker News Reader

To be fair, using Meta isn't exactly required, and they have no power over you if you don't use it. Experian will collect information about you as long as you take any credit ever, even if you never directly interact with them.

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I thought so too. Then when I wanted to sponsor my wife's immigration application, the government wanted to see that we'd posted sufficient photos of our relationship on social media as evidence that it was a legitimate relationship and not visa fraud. Once something becomes normal, there's a penalty to being different, I guess.

That’s disturbing. What if you don’t have an account?

I assume if you have a good excuse, like being Amish, they let it slide, but you'd probably need to make up for it with support letters from your Amish community leaders attesting to the realness of your marriage.

> government wanted to see that we'd posted sufficient photos of our relationship on social media as evidence that it was a legitimate relationship and not visa fraud

You’re fine if you say no. If you say you don’t have social media and they find you do, of course that’s fraud. But I know several couples off social who were asked, explained, and then showed photos off their camera roll and were fine.

Meta gathers information about you even if you don't have an account.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_profile

Have a feeling this is going to change real fast with FB becoming an extension of usgov

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