Job Applicants Asked for Facebook Passwords

[Yokai]

One step towards making the internet a decent place to visit.

Except the issue here is that your employer suddenly has the ability to log into your Facebook account, not that they're trying to see if your behavior is different on the internet. That allows for all sorts of invasions of privacy that they have no business in, as well as the ability to impersonate you on Facebook if they feel the need to, which is obviously fraud.

Besides, public pages on Facebook, where everyone uses their real names, usually with most of their personal information a click away, are often just as nasty and unpleasant as the rest of internet. It's not so much anonymity that is a factor so much as just distance and the knowledge that basically no one's going to get up from their desk and hunt you down based on a comment you made on the internet, no matter how much of a dick you are.

 

[BoredRolePlayer]

Really? Is it really that hard to figure out why employers would want your social network access while determining if they want to employ you?

Enlighten me then as to why it is exactly that just being allowed to view your account isn't enough and that they vitally require access to your personal online account?

There isn't really a reason for that, being able to look at your Facebook or Myspace I understand (it gives your employer a bit of insight into the individual they're possably going to have working for them) but this reasoning doesn't really extend towards allowing them to actually log into your account.

Many people lock their information so that only friends can view them, and they want to look into your private messages to make sure that you aren't participating in any illegal...whatevers.

I can think of many reasons why transparency is a good thing. (The primary reason being that it would save lives).

Anyone care to put forth an argument that's pro-privacy? And no, 'Privacy is a human right' is not a good argument. You have to explain why it's worth letting people die over.

I don't have a argument, but if you really believe what you say then do this for me.

On this forum I want you to post every site you have a membership to (like the escapist and twitter and facebook), the user name for those sites and passwords.

If you don't then all I can say is your a hypocrite who can preach it but not live it. I mean from how you sound privacy isn't a issue for you right?

 

[DanDeFool]

It may sound unlikely, but consider the words of former News of the World deputy editor Paul McMullen, who very likely summed up a widespread contemporary attitude toward privacy in his testimony at the Leveson Inquiry yesterday. "Privacy is for pedos," he said. "Fundamentally, no one else needs it."

How much you want to bet this guy turns out to be a closet homosexual like Ted Haggard? Everybody has something they'd at least rather not broadcast to the universe, if not something they go out of their way to conceal.

Ultimately, if this becomes common practice, it's going to mean one thing for sure. People who don't use social networking sites will either rule the fucking universe, or be shipped off to a big fat leper colony.

Think about it. If all employers start asking to get an inside look at your social networking accounts, and they run into candidates that just don't have them, will that be an automatic pass, or an automatic condemnation?

Will we get to the point where everybody, everywhere will essentially be forced to publish every single detail of their entire lives to the Internet for everyone to see, no matter how sordid, because if you don't you'll automatically be perceived as a suspicious and untrustworthy regardless of your actual conduct?

Or, will we get to the point that everyone who made the mistake of having even a single piece of derogatory information visible on their social networks will be perceived as MORE untrustworthy than those who didn't feel like sharing? In the latter case you don't know anything about them for sure, but in the former you have actual PROOF that they're a fuck-up!

Granted, both of these are slippery slope arguments, but this whole situation makes me wonder if we ought not start weighing our options on social networks more seriously.

 

[Atmos Duality]

By their logic, they should be allowed unlimited access to my computer, cell phone, and mail on the off chance I might be doing something illegal or otherwise questionable.
And I have to take them at their word that this information will not be compromised or abused in any fashion.

Fuck. That.

Fortunately, I don't have Myspace, Facebook, Twitter or any other public social profile account, and since the rest of my accounts are anonymous screen names, I could (and would) very easily lie if they ever demanded the passwords to those. They would have no way of knowing what I have, or don't have there; nor do they need to know for the purposes of employment.

 

[Guardian of Nekops]

On the other hand, what's legal and what's done are often two entirely different things, and if enough people just roll over for this and fill in the blanks without question, it could eventually become a common, or at least tolerated, practice.

This definitely smacks of the illegal, but I can believe that it'll become more common if we let it.

My proof? People aren't allowed to use your Social Security Number for ANYTHING. Nobody should be identifying you by that number unless they are the Social Security administration, so nobody is allowed to ask for it... not your job, not your landlord, not your medical personel... but it's convenient, so they all do. And you don't want to cause a fuss, so you give it to them.

You know, I could almost get behind the username bit. I do support the company's right to inspect the public image of who they hire, and if you have your drunk-out-of-your-mind photos on your profile for everyone to see, then your public face might not match up with what the company is willing to be associated with. On the other hand, it's none of their business what I do behind closed doors, and if they can't see it without my password then it is none of their business.

Oh, and if I didn't already have a Facebook I hadn't touched in years with nothing interesting on it, I'd be making a new one now. Constructing a boring vanilla profile that won't set off red flags for them isn't exactly hard to do, and if they're foolish enough to think you're giving them your real information... well, then suddenly covering your tracks gets easier.

 

[Risingblade]

Time to make a fake facebook account

 

[mooncalf]

These are not real people; people who think that everyone else in the world is or should be essentially just like them, and that whatever that is, is normal. WRONG.

I do not feel obliged to engage in a happy-clappy brain-meld of total honesty with others, otherwise I might have to point out every douche thing they do and feel counterproductive doing so, especially where their reactions are less enlightened than their attitude towards looking through my stuff.

Go away you voyeurist perverts.

*EDIT* And all that is irrelevant if it turns out this is just some kind of trick to seperate the stupids from the applicants.

 

[Char-Nobyl]

On the other hand, what's legal and what's done are often two entirely different things, and if enough people just roll over for this and fill in the blanks without question, it could eventually become a common, or at least tolerated, practice. It may sound unlikely, but consider the words of former News of the World deputy editor Paul McMullen, who very likely summed up a widespread contemporary attitude toward privacy in his testimony at the Leveson Inquiry yesterday. "Privacy is for pedos," he said. "Fundamentally, no one else needs it."

Something to bear in mind the next time you're annoyed about having to deal with online privacy settings - and when you're thinking about just how much personal information you want to put out there for the world to see.

I'm sorry, what? Facebook as a private messaging client built into it. In other words, a functional substitute to email at times. Is this guy also proposing that you hand over your email account for 'inspection'?

It's hilarious that he's trying to claim that the only people who keep secrets are pedophiles. That's the sort of bullshit that I'd expect from an adaptation of 1984, on some tongue-in-cheek propaganda poster: "REMEMBER, CITIZENS: ONLY CRIMINALS AND PEDOPHILES NEED PRIVACY. ARE YOU A PEDOPHILE?"

Many people lock their information so that only friends can view them, and they want to look into your private messages to make sure that you aren't participating in any illegal...whatevers.

Wait, what? How is that a legitimate excuse? The only way you could possibly justify that is if you were simultaneously demanding records of your phone conversations, your mail, email, etc. In other words: Facebook is one of the last places that people talk about doing illegal things.

I can think of many reasons why transparency is a good thing. (The primary reason being that it would save lives).

How? Explain to me how rifling through someone's Facebook account can "save lives." Unless the applicant is the worst serial killer in history and uploads pictures of his victims and restricts them to a specific circle of 'Friends,' it isn't going to reveal anything earthshattering.

Anyone care to put forth an argument that's pro-privacy? And no, 'Privacy is a human right' is not a good argument. You have to explain why it's worth letting people die over.

Where are people dying here? Jesus, you talk about it like this process has revealed applicants as mass-murderers who recorded their killings on Facebook.

Anywho, it would help stop things like this for one: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2019409/Joshua-Davies-16-dared-Facebook-friends-murder-Rebecca-Aylward.html

Here's a litmus test for the relevance of any evidence you plan to use:

Step 1: Ask yourself whether it was posted in the 'Daily Mail.'

Step 2: If the answer in Step 1 was 'Yes,' find another piece of evidence.

Many of the groups taking part in the London Riots used social networking sites to plan where to go smash up next. Not sure on the deaths/injuries/monetary damage caused on that one, but I imagine monetary damage was pretty large, if nothing else.

Yeah. Because I'm sure that they brought their laptops along and made groups for it. As opposed to, say, shouting to each other, calling people with phones, etc. You know, things infinitely easier than Facebook when you're in the midst of a riot.

 

[DirgeNovak]

I sincerely hope it's illegal and they need to take out that question from the form soon. There's an easy way to counter it though. Give the password up and change it as soon as you're hired. It's a lot harder for employers to fire you for "changing your facebook password" than it is to not hire you in the first place because you refused to give it/gave a fake one.

 

[DoctorFrankenStein]

I hope everyone who reads this application crumples it up and walks out of the station and they won't be able to hire anyone until this gross over-reach is removed. It's bad enough to spy on what your employees do on their off hours, demanding access to their accounts is just too much.
Even declaring something as innocent as being a pagan or an atheist is enough to turn off a potential employer. No one needs to know if someone likes kinky sex or getting drunk in in their free time.
People HAVE to have privacy, because the average human being will judge someone harshly on the smallest of things they don't agree with. The police have too much power as it is.

 

[userwhoquitthesite]

Completely illegal.

need to be sued

 

[MaxwellEdison]

Providing your password is a direct violation of the Facebook Terms of Service. Item 4, point 8: You will not share your password, (or in the case of developers, your secret key), let anyone else access your account, or do anything else that might jeopardize the security of your account.

Thus, the police force is asking for a person to break the terms of a previously agreed to contract. This is illegal to do, and as such cannot be used to discriminate against the person during the hiring process if they refuse to do so. Anybody who refuses to do so and subsequently does not get hired has a case against the North Carolina police department in question, and should sue.

This, this, a thousand times this. Please don't tell me anyone's going along with this shit.

 

[JMeganSnow]

And that's why my facebook account is completely locked to people who are not my friends.

Also, I would refuse to give this information. I'm sorry but there's simply no reason for you to be able to access my account. Sure you can look at it, I don't have anything to hide, but there's absolutely no logical reason for you to have my password.

Indeed. Next they'll want your credit card numbers.

 

[Starke]

So it's the police department that have done this? The applicants that refuse haven't really got too much choice then, can't imagine them getting very far if they say that it must be illegal and demand something to be done about it.

You'd need to be able to prove that you were otherwise completely eligible for the position to have standing on this one, so this one could be very hard to get into court.

 

[samsonguy920]

Why the employer would even need such information is debateable as well, are we sure this wasn't just another front for a scam like so many other 'wonderous easy jobs' you can find online are?

Really? Is it really that hard to figure out why employers would want your social network access while determining if they want to employ you?

A lot of reasons can easily be determined, all of them resting on a serious lack of trust, and a self-serving need to control your workforce. The day I end up with this question, it will be left blank. And when I get turned down I will ask why, and if they say incomplete application, then it will be the state employment office for my next stop. Asking for someone's password to anything is akin to asking for their PIN number or their safe deposit box key. It doesn't matter if I have absolutely nothing to hide and that I am squeaky clean. There are things that are kept out of your job. The only exception might be military or federal service, considering the security involved there. A police department in North Carolina doesn't really qualify.
Falsifying an application can be a legit reason for denying a job, however(not to mention could lead to legal action later if they do hire you and then find out you fibbed on your app), so make something up in that line and you won't have a leg to stand on. Either fill it in honestly or leave it blank.

 

[Darkmantle]

Really? Is it really that hard to figure out why employers would want your social network access while determining if they want to employ you?

Enlighten me then as to why it is exactly that just being allowed to view your account isn't enough and that they vitally require access to your personal online account?

There isn't really a reason for that, being able to look at your Facebook or Myspace I understand (it gives your employer a bit of insight into the individual they're possably going to have working for them) but this reasoning doesn't really extend towards allowing them to actually log into your account.

Many people lock their information so that only friends can view them, and they want to look into your private messages to make sure that you aren't participating in any illegal...whatevers.

I can think of many reasons why transparency is a good thing. (The primary reason being that it would save lives).

Anyone care to put forth an argument that's pro-privacy? And no, 'Privacy is a human right' is not a good argument. You have to explain why it's worth letting people die over.

Here's the problem, Sure it seems like a good idea, but what if the government decided that, I dunno, liking the colour purple, was illegal. If everything was completely transparent, hundreds of thousand of people who said they like purple at one time are now criminals and thrown in jail. Now I know this sounds crazy, and I hate to bring this into the thread, but things like this have happened before. for example, (sorry again) if hitler came about in modern times, and starting hunting jews, again, any jew that had a facebook page (because we are all about transparency now) would be immediately found out and captured. It would be impossible to hide.

privacy may protect criminals, but it also protects citizens against unjust laws.

 

[Ham_authority95]

Job Applicants Asked for Facebook Passwords

Applicants for a clerical job in North Carolina have been asked to provide their usernames and passwords for Facebook and any social networks they belong to.

It's not unusual for companies to check out Facebook sites of potential employees, but a police department in North Carolina took it one very disturbing step further by not only asking applicants for a clerical job whether they had a Facebook or MySpace site, but also demanding the usernames and passwords necessary to access them.

It's an outrageous demand - you wouldn't let a prospective employer come over to your house and root around in your medicine cabinet or underwear drawer, after all - and I have a hard time believing it's even legal to demand that kind of information in the first place. It's one thing to search the internet for publicly available information, but quite another to demand that people hand over the keys to their kingdom and deny them employment if they refuse to do so.

On the other hand, what's legal and what's done are often two entirely different things, and if enough people just roll over for this and fill in the blanks without question, it could eventually become a common, or at least tolerated, practice. It may sound unlikely, but consider the words of former News of the World deputy editor Paul McMullen, who very likely summed up a widespread contemporary attitude toward privacy in his testimony at the Leveson Inquiry yesterday. "Privacy is for pedos," he said. "Fundamentally, no one else needs it."

Something to bear in mind the next time you're annoyed about having to deal with online privacy settings - and when you're thinking about just how much personal information you want to put out there for the world to see.

Source: Tecca [http://www.tecca.com/news/2011/11/30/facebook-password-jobs/]


Permalink

"Oh, Facebook? Nah, I deleted mine a year ago. I like using my phone better." Lies are good.

So yeah, this is an enormous violation of privacy, and I would probably either lie like above or turn down the employment offer.

 

[Scars Unseen]

This is rough, It's like asking for a house key so they can root through your stuff every now and then, or a wire tap on your phone.
Not okay, even if you have nothing to hide, private conversations with trusted friends and loved ones are not privy to your employer.

It's not even that. Asking for a user name and password is like asking for your True Name so they can possess you and make you say things without your consent or knowledge.

 

[evilneko]

"Oh, Facebook? Nah, I deleted mine a year ago. I like using my phone better." Lies are good.

So yeah, this is an enormous violation of privacy, and I would probably either lie like above or turn down the employment offer.

Lies in the job application process tend to come back and bite you. Seeing such a question on an application, I would either leave it blank and only raise my objections to it if asked, or immediately re-evaluate whether I really wanted to work there.

 

[Formica Archonis]

Ahem: http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/03/privacy_and_pow.html

In which Bruce Schneier dismantles David Brin's The Transparent Society. A short quote:


If I disclose information to you, your power with respect to me increases. One way to address this power imbalance is for you to similarly disclose information to me. We both have less privacy, but the balance of power is maintained. But this mechanism fails utterly if you and I have different power levels to begin with.

An example will make this clearer. You're stopped by a police officer, who demands to see identification. Divulging your identity will give the officer enormous power over you: He or she can search police databases using the information on your ID; he or she can create a police record attached to your name; he or she can put you on this or that secret terrorist watch list. Asking to see the officer's ID in return gives you no comparable power over him or her. The power imbalance is too great, and mutual disclosure does not make it OK.

You can think of your existing power as the exponent in an equation that determines the value, to you, of more information. The more power you have, the more additional power you derive from the new data.

There's so much more at the link. Go read it, now.