by In this post we’re going to look at an important regulatory change affecting the diversity visa program. The U.S. Department of State has published a final rule in the Federal Register entitled, Visas Enhancing Vetting and Combating Fraud in the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program.
This rule introduces new requirements for people who wish to enter the DV lottery. It requires entrants to provide passport information and upload a scan of their passport biographic page when submitting a DV entry. Let’s go through what this rule says, why it was introduced and what it means for upcoming and future DV entrants.
What the new rule requires under the new regulation, anyone submitting a diversity visa entry must now provide valid unexpired passport information and a scan of their passport’s biographic page, uploaded to the electronic DV entry form. Entrants who qualify for certain exemptions will be able to indicate that they are exempt from the passport requirement. But for most applicants, the passport will be mandatory at the time of entry.
This represents a significant procedural change for the diversity visa lottery. In recent years, applicants could submit an entry without providing passport details. They only needed a passport at the time of their interview.
But with this new rule, the passport comes in at the initial entry stage of the diversity visa process. This new passport rule applies only to the main applicant and not to his or her dependents.
When the rule takes effect, according to the Federal Register Notice, the rule will take effect on April 10, 2026. That’s about a month from now. Because the next diversity visa lottery has not yet been announced. The expectation is that this new requirement will apply when the next entry period opens.
That means upcoming and future entrants should be prepared to provide a valid passport and a passport biographic page scan. When submitting their DV entry.
Why the State Department introduced this rule?
According to the State Department, the purpose of the rule is to combat fraud and improve the integrity of the DV program. The Department says it has encountered millions of fraudulent entries submitted by unauthorized third parties in the DV-2025 cycle alone.
The Department reported discovering approximately 2.5 million fraudulent entries. These fraudulent submissions are often linked to agents or intermediaries who submit entries on behalf of individuals without their knowledge or consent. After submitting an entry, the agent keeps the unique confirmation number, which is required to check the lottery results.
Some agents then withhold the confirmation number, unless the individual pays a fee or agrees to other unscrupulous conditions. According to the State Department, requiring passport information and a passport biographic page scan will allow the government to verify identities earlier in the process and reduce this type of abuse. This is not the first time a passport requirement has been introduced for the Diversity Visa Lottery, during the previous administration of President Donald Trump.
The State Department implemented a similar rule requiring DV entrants to provide passport information. At the time, a scan and upload of the biographic page were not required, however, that requirement was later struck down by a federal court after it concluded that the Department had not adequately justified the requirement during the rulemaking process. As a result, the passport requirement was removed and DV entries once again became possible without providing passport information.
The newly published rule represents an effort by the State Department to reintroduce the passport requirement through a revised regulatory framework, other changes included in the notice.
In addition to the passport requirement, the rule also makes several technical changes to the Diversity Visa regulations. These include standardizing regulatory language by adding the word shall in certain provisions to clarify mandatory requirements for consular officers, replacing the term gender with the term sex in the regulations following a recent executive order, and replacing the term age with date of birth to better reflect the information collected during the immigrant visa process.
These changes are primarily technical and do not significantly alter the DV entry process. Possible consequences for DV applicants, while the rule is intended to reduce fraud, it may also have practical consequences for DV applicants. For example, prospective entrants without a valid passport are no longer allowed to submit a DV entry, entrants will need to upload their passport biographic page scan as part of the electronic entry form, and individuals who previously relied on agents or intermediaries to submit their entries will now need to provide them with additional documentation.
How these changes will affect the overall number of entries and participation levels remains to be seen. For now, the key point is that the Diversity Visa entry process is expected to change, future entrants should be prepared to provide passport information and a passport biographic page scan when submitting their DV entry. The new rule is scheduled to take effect on April 10, 2026, and it will therefore apply to the next Diversity Visa Lottery when it is announced.
As always, we will continue to monitor developments and provide updates as more information becomes available. For now, that is all. Thank you for reading.
