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"So, do you believe, for example, that if someone were secretly in the PLA or even ErBu, and used being a student here as a means of spying, that this fact would be discovered by the typical H1B hiring and screening process at the typical corporation?" Anyone with enough skills to get into the US through H1B would very likely not be a terrorist but I suppose they could be terrorist sympathizers and supporters. The common trait for nearly all terrorists is that they're unemployed and have nothing to lose. Consider Raymond Stock an expert on Arabic literature and media based in Cairo: "I don't think the Persons of Mass Destructions (suicide bombers/terrorists) are really a product of local Iraqi resentment against us. They are mainly imported cookie-cutter killers, created by a combination of Arab mass media, certain extremist elements in Muslim culture, and some very shrewd recruiting by Al Qaeda and its ilk. When young, angry, futureless, sexually repressed people are taught that death is a permanent vacation of guilt-free pleasure, and they see it glorified in countless videos, all you need is a willing truck driver to ferry them over the border from Syria, Jordan, Turkey or Saudi Arabia and presto — a human bomb." The US already has the highest number of Palestinian emigres and students of any country (and there really aren't that many) but I've yet to hear anything about Palestinians benefiting from espionage. Even if they stole some knowledge or recieved some training from those corporations, it would not be of any use to the Palestinians since they lack the infrastructure to take significant advantage of it. The techonology to build a decent home is out there but they're content with their 'refugee camps' and lobbing rocks and the occasional mortar. Consider that our patent system requires disclosure sufficient for someone 'skilled in the field' to recreate an invention or technology in order to claimed in a patent. This is how foreign countries are able to manufacture generic versions of US corporation's drugs. The technology that terrorists and spies would find useful is either already out there or require security clearance for access not just a H1B check. One of my brothers works for Boeing and has secret level clearance; almost no Palestinian would even get classified level clearance much less the useful top secret stuff. (Financial and political support to terrorist organizations are a different story but there are plenty of leftists in this country that already do that.) Most high tech companies already have pretty good security to prevent corporate espionage and a good portion of that translates to prevention of plain espionage.