Govt. agencies, colleges demand applicants' Facebook passwords

[villager]

Govt. agencies, colleges demand applicants' Facebook passwords

By Bob Sullivan

If you think privacy settings on your Facebook and Twitter accounts guarantee future employers or schools can't see your private posts, guess again.

Employers and colleges find the treasure-trove of personal information hiding behind password-protected accounts and privacy walls just too tempting, and some are demanding full access from job applicants and student athletes.

In Maryland, job seekers applying to the state's Department of Corrections have been asked during interviews to log into their accounts and let an interviewer watch while the potential employee clicks through wall posts, friends, photos and anything else that might be found behind the privacy wall.

Previously, applicants were asked to surrender their user name and password, but a complaint from the ACLU stopped that practice last year. While submitting to a Facebook review is voluntary, virtually all applicants agree to it out of a desire to score well in the interview, according Maryland ACLU legislative director Melissa Coretz Goemann.

Student-athletes in colleges around the country also are finding out they can no longer maintain privacy in Facebook communications because schools are requiring them to "friend" a coach or compliance officer, giving that person access to their “friends-only” posts. Schools are also turning to social media monitoring companies with names like UDilligence and Varsity Monitor for software packages that automate the task. The programs offer a "reputation scoreboard" to coaches and send "threat level" warnings about individual athletes to compliance officers.

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http://redtape.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/06/10585353-govt-agencies-colleges-demand-applicants-facebook-passwords

[MrCoffee]

1. What happens to applicants/athletes who don't use Facebook/Twitter?

My first thought when I read this article earlier was "What if they don't believe me that I'm not on Facebook?" Would that hurt someone's chance at a job?

[Ilsa]

2. I'm not on Facebook.

Hubby is, but I don't even know his PW.

[woodsprite]

3. Wanna bet they have a keystroke logger on the computer they have them use. n/t

[Justice wanted]

4. The place I use to work at Get "encouraging" employees to get connected with facebook page

And when a employee was fired because he vented on his facebook page when he had a bad day people felt awkward.


This is going to start being the norm if we don't stop this.


A person should have a personal life that IS NOT going to effect Employment.

[MrCoffee]

5. I have coworkers who are "Facebook friends" with management/supervisors

That seems so incredibly stupid to me.

[treestar]

6. I'm thinking they'll eventually realize this is useless and get over the fascination with Facebook

Some employers seem to think it's some sort of miracle of revelation.

[hobbit709]

7. I would tell them to take that idea and fold it until it is all sharp corners.

and they know where to put it.

[Warpy]

8. Same here, and especially for employers! This is just insane

and is very much like having secret police tapping your phones and monitoring your conversations around the dinner table to make sure you don't say anything the corporation would not approve of in its advertising.

I don't have a Facebook account, their security is appalling and besides, I don't need people from my past looking me up. There's usually a very good reason they're in my past.

I do have a Twitter account but I think I might have posted 3 messages in as many years. I just find it useful to surf when there's breaking news.

[Speck Tater]

9. I never have, nor will I ever be on Face Book.

I guess that makes me a troglodyte.

[TheCentepedeShoes]

12. Nor me either

I am old enough to remember party lines

[Speck Tater]

15. I remember "I Like Ike" campaign buttons. Beat that! nt

[TheCentepedeShoes]

16. I remember the I LIke Ike

TV ads from 1956 - the parading cartoon characters
Plus, I actually met Ike in 1952 when he was doing a campaign stop in his real hometown of Dennison TX
We were passing through on the way from Oklahoma to visit the maternal grandparents in Texas
As the story goes - OK maybe I don't actually remember it, I was only three - we pulled up next to his car trying to get around the parade route
Imagine doing that today
Dad saluted the General
Dad was in the Merchant Marine in WWII

[Speck Tater]

17. The only president I ever met...

was when he wasn't president yet. In fact he was just running for governor and made a campaign stop at the company where I worked. At the time we thought it was pretty comical that a cowboy actor who could barely read and write thought he could be governor of California.

I think Ike was the first election I was really aware of what was happening. I was 7.

[TheCentepedeShoes]

18. Raygun was the

luncheon speaker at a convention I was at in New Orleans in the late 70's
A couple of guys from a company in California that my company did business with and I skipped out and hit the French Quarter for lunch, one that didn't feature rubber chicken, and some antique shopping

[LiberalFighter]

10. The only thing I can see as necessary would be the student athlete in a college setting.

More than likely the coach or compliance officer are doing so to keep the athlete out of trouble or decrease the possibility of an athlete doing something stupid.


I would tell a possible employer to shove it. Or just tell them that I don't use Facebook and they just demonstrated one of many reasons that I don't use it.

[Justice wanted]

11. I have to disagree with you on that one.

[Generic Other]

13. I post DU articles, videos I make and archaeology articles

Even I think I sound boring! Ha!

[saras]

14. It would be SO TEMPTING to create a fake page just for them...

...you mean nobody ever does that?