April 22, 2012 at 8:20 pm
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Social Media and Interviews
April 23, 2012 at 12:02 am
I do not find this acceptable, it's going too much towards 1984.
However, if I were to get the log and pass to the boss account in return, they want to know me and I them, then who knows haha.
April 23, 2012 at 12:58 am
If an employer asks for my Facebook password I can quite truthfully say I don't have one...wonder what would happen then? Would they be forced to reject my job application because I don't have Facebook? To me, that's a scarier prospect than being asked the question in the first place!
April 23, 2012 at 2:22 am
I would be worried if a prospective employee gave me their password for any system (not that I would ask) as this would show a poor attitude to security. Shame on the employers aswell as asking for passwords goes against most internal policies on system security.
However that said I can see why an employer would want to know what is going on with a prospective employee - they might rant on facebook about their current employer and also may be members of extremist groups. As an employer I would not want to hire anyone that might have racist tendancies, for example. Like it or not their facebook profile may expose this.
April 23, 2012 at 3:14 am
skanker (4/23/2012)
...I can see why an employer would want to know what is going on with a prospective employee... I would not want to hire anyone that might have racist tendancies, for example.
To take this away from the Facebook context, this would be equivalent to asking a prospective employee to search their home for correspondance.
Does anyone know if that is legal?
How about a copy of the visa section of their passport? Or a copy of all the email they sent over the last year? Or a copy of their GPS tracking information to check they didn't go anywhere dodgy?
Clearly access to the Facebook account is an easy way to do a check, but equally clearly in most circumstances it's wrong.
Trouble is if the job applicant needs the job, they will agree to just about anything the employer requests.
April 23, 2012 at 3:27 am
I agree with David. It would no doubt be extremely nice to know about all the gory details of an employee's private life before hiring them, but it should be obvious that this is a bad direction to be going in! Where do you draw the line--maybe searching through a potential employee's dustbins for anything personal?
April 23, 2012 at 5:11 am
I DO/WILL NOT Facebook, so no problem in that respect. Too many security holes for my taste.
But like others, I wonder what the company response would be. Most states are at-will states. Would it not be fair for me to ask for the interviewer's Facebook access? Of the CEO? After all, most placement professionals claim the interview is to be a two-way process. I'll show you mine if you show me yours?
I recently had a prospective employer require that I reveal the names of any other potential employers. I refused, stating that I would not divulge that information to any employer, recruiter or other 'interested' party. I see no difference between the two. Granted, social media makes it easy to espouse less-than-PC views than are less likely to turn up in providing a prospective employer name. Then again a prospective employer may have the same issue just because of the identity of another prospect. But no employer ever offered to tell me the names of other prospects for any position. What is the difference?
------------
Buy the ticket, take the ride. -- Hunter S. Thompson
April 23, 2012 at 5:19 am
Steve - this is a great topic, thanks for bringing it up!
With recent changes in US law (e.g., NDAA), it seems privacy is quickly becoming a thing of the past. In my mind, there is absolutely no legitimate reason to give a potential employer your Facebook credentials. This is a trick question at best - to test if you would give up any of your security credentials. Sort of like phishing.
I agree with the person who suggested not having a Facebook account - if an employer refused to hire you because you don't have a Facebook account, perhaps there is potential for a discrimination lawsuit. For those of you who must have Facebook to keep in touch with friends, do like I do and create it in the name of your dog or cat. Only give it out to your friends that you trust.
April 23, 2012 at 6:02 am
G Bryant McClellan (4/23/2012)...I refused, stating that I would not divulge that information to any employer, recruiter or other 'interested' party...
Good for you Bryant. Did you get the job? Could you afford to lose the job? Would you have given the same answer if you really needed/wanted the job?
April 23, 2012 at 6:08 am
Governments across the world are bringing in anti-privacy measures in the name of counter terrorism and to preserve copyright. I say if there's a need, make sure each instance of its use is (1) clearly targetted (like at a particular person or website) and (2) is properly authorised by the legislature (like a judge, or in the UK, a magistrate).
Without these two provisions, these governments' citizens will no longer be free in any sense.
April 23, 2012 at 7:03 am
A big problem with Facebook, Google etc is they insist on your 'true name' rather than nickname or pseudonym. Anyone (potential employer, nosy neighbor, stalker, etc) can find out much more about you than you realize with just a search engine. Particularly if you use those single sign on services to post on other websites. it can expose a lot about your just pulling together favorite restaurants, activities & hobbies, friends names, comments about current weather, etc. People in sensitive situations have been outed by such investigations.
As has been pointed out, besides violating terms of service (Facebook is threatening legal action against employers) it may well violate Federal law because there are lots of facts about an employee that potential employers are prohibited from asking (religion, racial makeup, marital and sexual orientation details) which would be obvious from their web page.
...
-- FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers --
April 23, 2012 at 7:10 am
Employers are concerned with several issues related to social networking. One issues is that some employees tend to write their grievances on social networking sites in what feels like private or anonymous conversation, but becomes public or something in-between private and public. Disclosure of sensitive company information is another issue.
These kinds of issues should be covered with employment agreements and non-disclosure agreements, but how do you verify without intruding into employees social networks?
But I agree that social networks like Facebook should remain private. I would not give anyone a key to my home and let a stranger rumage around my sensitive papers or my computers (without a warrant) and I won't grant an employer access to my social network accounts. But I also won't post anything negative or sensitive about my employer online either.
April 23, 2012 at 7:19 am
The issue with this is as well as asking for you to breech your terms and conditions and compromise your own confidentiality, they are also asking you to compromise the confidentiality of your friends and family. If you have been privately messaging a friend/family member about a private matter which they do not want made public, then you are releasing this information to strangers. That's apart from the situation where someone posts something uncharacteristically assenine.
In all honesty, merely being asked this would be an instant "Thanks for your time, hope you find someone suitable" situation for me - although I've not heard about this being practice in the UK.
Personally I have nothing I've posted there I would regard as a skeleton in the closet, but this kind of intrusive nonsense is not the sign of a reasonable employer
I'm a DBA.
I'm not paid to solve problems. I'm paid to prevent them.
April 23, 2012 at 7:19 am
If a prospective employer asked you for a list of everyone you've ever known, and for details of every interaction you'd ever had with all of them, they'd recognize that as being (a) insane, (b) intrusive, and (c) illegal.
If an employer found out that you were the kind of person who gives up usernames and passwords just for the asking, and violated contractual agreements (EULA is a contract) for personal financial gain (getting employed), would they consider that a positive thing about you?
But the people who write this kind of policy aren't smart enough to understand that their actions have consequences beyond their own convenience. They see what's in it for them, and don't care about ramifications beyond that, because they are, to be blunt, just plain too idiotic and ignorant for their own good.
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread
"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
April 23, 2012 at 7:29 am
Glad that almost everybody on this thread agrees that asking for Facebook passwords is a bad idea. I do FB, but I have a policy of not friending (on FB) anybody from work. I will connect with coworkers on Linked In (a professional network), but not on personal networks.
Would be very curious to hear the perspective of somebody who has been on the opposite side of the desk, somebody who has asked for a potential employee's FB password. Why did you do it?
Hakim Ali
www.sqlzen.com
Viewing 15 posts - 1 through 15 (of 200 total)
You must be logged in to reply to this topic. Login to reply