The official DV lottery website is different and the US government does not request users to share the application link.

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This website purportedly offering the 2023 United States of America (USA) Diversity Immigrant Visa (DV) lottery also known as green card is a HOAX.

DV Program is an initiative of the United States government that provides immigrant visas to citizens of countries with low immigration rates.

The website uses this URL “https://green-card-lottery-2023.abancy.com/#1697106753899” and purports to offer a platform where users can submit their 2023 DV applications.

The first stage of the application requests a user’s basic data such as name, country and gender.

The next phase requires prospective applicants to validate their names, select a visa type, after which they are expected to share the link with at least 15 groups or five friends on WhatsApp.

But is the website authentic?

Glaring red flags, such as use of a dot com URL for an official USA government website and requesting users to share the link, prompted us to look into the site.

We checked the US Embassy in Nairobi’s verified X (formerly Twitter) account and Facebook page and established that the official and only DV lottery website is dvprogram.state.gov.

Unlike the imposter website that uses a .com URL, the legitimate site uses a state.gov URL, which is the official domain of the US government.

We performed a Whois search on the website under investigation and established that it was created on 29 August 2023 and registered in the United Kingdom.

Genuine sites tend to be much older than hoax sites, which also tend to have concealed registrant details, thus raising suspicion.

A similar search for the authentic website indicated that details of the ‘state.gov’ domain were not available on the platform.

We browsed through the legitimate website and discovered that the 2023 DV lottery application and selection process elapsed on 7 September 2023.

What is currently being offered is the 2025 DV lottery application that commenced on 4 October 2023 and will close on 7 November 2023.

On 6 October 2023, the US Embassy in Nairobi urged prospective applicants to ensure they use the genuine site while submitting their applications.

This post is part of an ongoing series of PesaCheck fact-checks examining content marked as potential misinformation on Facebook and other social media platforms.

By partnering with Facebook and similar social media platforms, third-party fact-checking organisations like PesaCheck are helping to sort fact from fiction. We do this by giving the public deeper insight and context to posts they see in their social media feeds.

Have you spotted what you think is fake or false information on Facebook? Here’s how you can report. And, here’s more information on PesaCheck’s methodology for fact-checking questionable content.

This fact-check was written by PesaCheck fact-checker Rodgers Omondi and edited by PesaCheck senior copy editor Cédrick Irakoze.

The article was approved for publication by PesaCheck managing editor Doreen Wainainah.