For many people around the world, Canada represents opportunity: a chance to study, work, reunite with family, or build a new life. But the path to the Canadian dream coexists in a marketplace of advisers, recruiters, consultants, agents, and intermediaries that has been prone to immigration fraud for decades. The federal government hopes new regulations governing immigration and citizenship consultants will help strengthen public protection and improve accountability.
On May 6, IRCC announced regulations that tighten oversight of licensed immigration and citizenship consultants. Most provisions take effect July 15, while expanded public-register requirements will begin in April 2027. The rules strengthen complaints, discipline and investigations, clarify governance requirements and establish guidelines for compensating people who suffer financial losses because of dishonest acts by licensed consultants the reforms mainly apply to. They do not give the College direct regulatory authority over every overseas recruiters, document sellers or unauthorized advisers, nor do they address every case in which an applicant submits false information.
Interviews with immigration lawyers, regulators and government officials suggest that while the new regulations strengthen oversight of licensed consultants, many of the underlying fraud challenges extend well beyond the regulated profession. At the heart of the problem regarding exploitation within the immigration system lies a difficult question: how much can regulation accomplish when immigration fraud emerges from a combination of human vulnerability, global demand, highly lucrative incentives for bad actors and networks that operate far outside Canada’s regulatory framework?
Taken together, the interviews point to a broader explanation. Rather than a problem confined to consultant misconduct, immigration fraud appears to arise at the intersection of three overlapping markets: the market of opportunity, driven by persistent labour needs and demand for specialized skills, the contributions of immigrant entrepreneurs and immigration’s central role in sustaining Canada’s population growth, attracting workers, students, entrepreneurs and other prospective newcomers seeking a pathway to Canada. The market of service providers, populated by lawyers, consultants, recruiters and advisers who help applicants navigate complex immigration processes; and the market of hope – where dreams of a better future create demand for quick results, shortcuts and promises that no legitimate representative can guarantee. Immigration fraud is not merely a story about dishonest consultants, it is often the product of what happens when these three dynamics collide.
In written responses to New Canadian Media, the IRCC said the reforms build upon measures already introduced since the creation of the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants (CICC) in 2021. “The College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants plays an important role in protecting people from fraud and misconduct, and in supporting the integrity of Canada’s immigration system,” a spokesperson for the department said.
According to the IRCC, the new regulations sharpen disciplinary tools, expand key pieces of information available through the College’s public register to protect individuals from fraud, improve the investigation process to confront bad actors and establish clearer rules governing compensation of victims of dishonest conduct by licensed consultants.
The College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants welcomes the changes. “Starting July 15, 2026, new College Regulations will allow eligible individuals access to compensation if they have a proven financial loss due to a licensed consultant’s dishonest actions and if they were not complicit,” a representative of the College wrote in a statement.
The regulators also emphasized that disciplinary decisions involving licensees are publicly available and that additional transparency measures will help prospective clients make informed decisions before retaining a consultant.
While the new regulations strengthen oversight of licensed consultants, some lawyers say they address only part of a much larger problem. Toronto immigration lawyer Mary Lam notes that many of the most troubling cases she encounters involve inaccurate work histories, questionable supporting documentation, unauthorized advice and applicants who seek legal assistance only after significant damage has already occurred. “The most widespread scheme I witnessed was the recycled use of bank statements and work offers,” Lam said. In such cases, documents originally prepared for one applicant may be reused for others to create the appearance that financial or employment requirements have been met.
She says many clients arrive after years of unsuccessful applications, multiple refusals, or while already facing removal proceedings which can result in deportation. By that stage, pursuing complaints against consultants or advisers can become extraordinarily difficult. “Once removal proceedings begin, commencing a parallel complaint against the consultant is too time-consuming,” she said.
Lam also highlighted one of the most uncomfortable realities surrounding immigration fraud: not every case fits neatly into categories of innocent victim and deliberate fraudster. “In 9 out of 10 cases clients will not complain if there are fraudulent documents or inaccurate case history as they have to sign off on forms so they must have known,” she said. “Only when there is negligence on the part of the consultant will a client follow through with a complaint or if a form was sent in without their signature.”
That assessment is echoed by Mario Bellissimo, founding partner of Bellissimo Law Group in Toronto, who cautions that immigration fraud often defies simple distinctions of victims and perpetrators. While many applicants are genuinely deceived and exploited, he says others knowingly participate in schemes involving fraudulent documents, fabricated employment histories, or purchased job offers in the hope of obtaining an immigration advantage. Effective response, he argues, must protect the vulnerable individuals while also preserving the integrity of Canada’s immigration system.
Together, their observations illustrate a layer of real-life situations often absent from public discussion of immigration fraud. Fear, desperation, misunderstanding, language barriers, family pressure, financial hardship and uncertainty about immigration status can blur the line between victimization and complicity.
Bellissimo welcomes the new regulations as an important step towards improving accountability, transparency and public confidence in the consulting profession. But he cautions against treating consultant misconduct as the sole source of immigration fraud. “Consultant regulation alone cannot solve immigration fraud,” he said. Much of the misconduct, he argues, originates elsewhere in the immigration ecosystem, involving recruiters, education agents, employers, document vendors and offshore intermediaries who often operate beyond the reach of Canadian regulators. “Fraud and misconduct often occur before a person ever reaches a licensed immigration representative,” Bellissimo said, arguing that protecting applicants requires accountability across the broader immigration system rather than focusing on any single profession.
Amandeep Hayer, an immigration lawyer based in British Columbia, agrees that stronger oversight may improve accountability but questions whether additional regulation alone will substantially reduce fraud. Instead, he argues that greater emphasis should be placed on raising professional entry standards for consultants.
“I don’t think it’s a regulation problem,” he said. “I think you need more of an investment in education.”
Pointing to British Columbia’s notary profession, Hayer notes that candidates must complete both undergraduate and postgraduate education before qualifying for practice. He believes a similarly rigorous pathway for immigration consultants would strengthen the profession by attracting practitioners who have made significant investment in their qualifications and are therefore less likely to jeopardize their careers through misconduct. He insists that higher educational requirements would professionalize the field and create stronger incentives for practitioners to uphold professional standards.
He also cautions against viewing immigration fraud solely as an offshore problem. While unauthorized advisers operating abroad present significant challenges, he says misconduct can also originate within Canada. In his view, improving professional standards domestically and strengthening enforcement internationally should be seen as complementary rather than competing responses.
The College acknowledges that unauthorized practitioners remain a major concern. An unauthorized practitioner is anyone who provides Canadian immigration advice for a fee without being licensed by the College, a provincial law society, or Quebec’s chambre des notaires. “Unauthorized practitioners pose a serious threat to the public by providing unethical, incompetent and illegal immigration services to prospective newcomers to Canada who may be vulnerable to exploitation,” the College said.
While the College cannot directly regulate individuals who operate outside its statutory authority, it says it has adopted a broader public-protection strategy. All licensed practitioners, regardless of where they practise, are bound by the same Code of Professional Conduct. The College also works with partner organizations and conducts multilingual fraud-prevention campaigns in Canada and abroad.
According to the regulatory body, “a series of enforcement actions by the College since 2024 has shut down more than 10,000 social media pages and websites advertising unauthorized practitioners.” However, it says it does not have statistics on the number of applicants harmed by such actors.
For prospective immigrants abroad, the distinction between licensed representatives and unauthorized actors is often far from obvious. Fraudulent actors frequently employ sophisticated marketing, professional-looking websites, forged documentation or cloned credentials to create the appearance of legitimacy.
That reality exposes one of the central limitations of consultant regulation. While licensed consultants can be investigated, disciplined, suspended, or stripped of their licences, many unauthorized advisers operate from outside Canada, beyond the reach of Canadian regulatory authority.
Yameena Ansari, an Alberta-based immigration lawyer, says the consequences of immigration fraud become visible only after the damage has already been done. She estimates that a significant proportion of her consultations involve clients seeking help after receiving poor or fraudulent immigration advice Rather than preparing new applications, she says, much of the work involves repairing problems created by incompetent or predatory representatives, errors that could have been avoided had applicants received authorized, ethical advice from the outset.
The consequences, she says, can be devastating. Beyond losing substantial sums of money, applicants may face refused applications, allegations of misrepresentation, loss of legal status, removal from Canada and prolonged family separation.
Ansari argues that the new regulations represent an important step but leave one of the most significant sources of immigration fraud largely untouched. While stronger oversight may improve accountability among licensed consultants, she says many sophisticated fraud schemes originate outside Canada, where regulators and law enforcement have little or no jurisdiction.
“The most glaring gap remains our inability to police international territory,” she said. “We are essentially fortifying the house inside Canada while leaving the front gates open abroad.”
She believes immigration fraud increasingly operates as a transnational enterprise requiring an international response. “Immigration fraud is an international crime enterprise, and fighting it with purely domestic Canadian laws is like bringing a knife to a gunfight,” Ansari said. She argues that Canada should establish dedicated cross-border enforcement partnerships with major source countries, including real-time information sharing and joint investigations to identify and prosecute overseas fraud networks.
Without stronger international cooperation, she warns, Canadian regulators will continue treating the consequences rather than the source of the problem. “Until we establish aggressive, proactive enforcement mechanisms at source-country levels, international fraud networks will continue to bypass these domestic protections,” she said.
Ansari also questions whether compensation alone is sufficient for victims. While the new regulations establish a compensation fund for proven financial losses caused by dishonest licensed consultants, she notes that many victims lose more than money. “More than money, what victims want is the immigration dream that they were promised,” she said, arguing for closer coordination among IRCC, the College, provincial law societies, and the Canada Border Services Agency so that victims of immigration fraud are unfairly penalized in their immigration cases.
The IRCC, however, notes that applicants are not required to hire representatives and that all immigration forms and instructions are available free of charge through the department’s website. The College similarly encourages prospective clients to verify representatives through its public register and to rely only on contact information listed there.
Whether the new regulations ultimately reduce immigration fraud remains an open question. What appears more certain is that stronger oversight will improve accountability within the licensed consulting profession.
Government officials acknowledge, however, that consultant regulation is only one component of a broader response. The federal government says the reforms form part of a wider strategy that includes legislative changes, closer collaboration with the Canada Border Services Agency, law enforcement and international partners, and expanded information-sharing to disrupt organized fraud schemes.
Even so, the larger challenge may be addressing the broader ecosystem in which immigration fraud occurs – fuelled not only by dishonest actors but also by hopes, pressures and uncertainty that accompany migration itself. As Canada continues to rely on immigration to support economic growth and demographic renewal, regulators may find that protecting newcomers requires more than disciplining bad consultants; it may also require confronting the global immigration market, where fraudulent actors find the most fertile ground for exploitation.
For Ansari, the issue ultimately extends beyond regulation. “Immigration fraud is fundamentally a human tragedy, not a paperwork problem,” she said. “Behind every red-flagged file or refused application is a real family.” The true cost of this systemic fraud, she argues, “is measured in shattered lives, broken trust, and stolen futures. Protecting these applicants is not just a matter of regulatory compliance; it is a profound moral imperative for Canada.”
Aloa Alota
Aloa Alota is a recipient of the 2025 Press Freedom Hero Award from the Gambia Press
Union. He is author (with Demba Ali Jawo) of A Living Mirror: The Life of Deyda
Hydara, which examines journalism, power, and risk through the life of the slain
Gambian journalist - Deyda Hydara. The work has been endorsed by Reporters Without
Borders (RSF) and adopted by the Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) as
an advocacy text on freedom of expression in Africa. He holds a PhD in Media Studies
from Western University, London, Ontario.