US Military Data Breach Prompts Immigrant Recruits to Apply for US Asylum

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WASHINGTON — While the U.S. government has announced efforts to prevent or decrease the flow of Central American asylum-seekers, some migrants find themselves applying for protection, even though they had not planned to do so.

Jason Ma came to the United States from China in 2011 under a student visa. Despite his parents' “stable jobs and some savings,” they still had difficulty affording all of his expenses in U.S. After graduation, Ma decided to stay in the United States.

“I majored in statistics — both my bachelor's and master's — and I did both my degrees from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign,” he told VOA.

He qualified for the Military Accessions Vital to the National Interest program (MAVNI), launched in 2009 to bring immigrants with medical or language skills into the U.S. armed services, and enlisted in 2016 before the program was shut down that year.

Though Ma is officially enlisted, he is still waiting to leave for basic training. In October 2017, citing national security concerns, the U.S. government retroactively required background checks on all MAVNI applicants, including those currently serving or waiting for basic training.

Ma found out in March that he also had to apply for asylum.

Data breach

A U.S. military data breach between July 2017 and January 2018 released hundreds of immigrant recruits’ sensitive information. Some have quickly filed for asylum since they suddenly face potentially life-threatening situations if they were to return to their countries after serving in the U.S. military.

VOA has learned that more than 4,000 recruits’ information was compromised, among them 1,087 Chinese and 82 Russian immigrant soldiers. Ma recently found out his name was on the list.

To Darin Johnson, a professor at Howard University School of Law, the breach puts participants and their families in vulnerable situations.

"It subjects MAVNI recruits, who weren't necessarily subject to persecution back home, and now opens up the door for them, as well," he said.

Johnson, a former assistant general counsel to the Army Secretariat, said the U.S. is engaged in a range of Special Forces operations around the world, “often in many places where you do have very repressive regimes. So, I think it's important for us to think about the danger to the MAVNI recruits themselves."

According to Chinese criminal law, those found colluding “with a foreign State to endanger the sovereignty, territorial integrity and security of the People's Republic of China shall be sentenced to life imprisonment or fixed-term imprisonment of not less than 10 years.”