Employer background checks might include your drunken facebook photos

[morosco]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:10pm

The FTC has given thumbs up to a company, Social Intelligence Corp., selling a new kind of employee background check to employers. This one scours the internet for your posts and pictures to social media sites and creates a file of all the dumb stuff you ever uploaded online.
New Services Adds Your Drunken Facebook Photos To Employer Background Checks

[Kad]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:16pm

I've heard of employers checking your Facebook on their own to do a "background check", or just to keep tabs.

[uncageg]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:18pm

So, can they still see things even with your privacy setting not public? None of my stuff is public. I have it set to friends only.

[morosco]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:19pm

Where I work we do the same thing. Facebook is the first place we look.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:20pm

I actually find this less invasive than being asked to pee in a cup or having one's credit checked.

[uncageg]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:40pm

I find it equally as invasive and much less of a reason not to hire someone. You could not get a job or lose your job for just having fun. That's scary.

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:43pm

Well they'd see pictures of me with Bernadette Peters, Patti LuPone, Elaine Stritch, etc. So I'm guessing I won't get a job with any big sports teams.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:44pm

Well, the "not getting a job just for having fun" argument also applies to the urine testing. :)

I've always thought we as a society give our employers and potential employers way too much control over us. That coupled with the advent of social media and the fact that it is totally an employer's market makes this just seem inevitable to me.

[Jay Lerner-Z]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 2:49pm

If people expect privacy on facebook then they're crackers.

[Eris0303]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 3:04pm

I used to be friendly with someone who was not hired for a job for posting that she wanted to have George Clooney's baby on MySpace. People do look and it can make a difference in whether you get hired or not.

[IAMWHATIAM]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 3:06pm

I wouldn't at all see it as losing or not getting a job "for just having fun", but rather for having really poor judgment, and for not understanding or caring about the consequences of one's actions in a world where old definitions of private and public no longer apply. I spend a lot of time discussing this with my 2 teenagers, and am regularly disturbed when I log into their facebook accounts (with full disclosure to my kids and their full knowledge that I regularly check their accounts) and see what their "friends" (another word that's lost its meaning) post.

Updated On: 6/21/11 at 03:06 PM

[uncageg]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 3:15pm

I am going to take down a lot of picks because I realized my friends can copy them. I don't have drunken pics on there. Probably because the people I am with when drinking are too drunk to take a picture!

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 3:52pm

I'm counting on HR directors not subscribing to my cam4 channel.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:04pm

IAMWHATIAM, I see your point, but then I look at Eris's post and realize that no matter what you put out there, there's a good chance someone can find fault with it. I fail to see what's so offensive about someone commenting that they'd want to have George Clooney's baby. Hell, I hear women (and men!) say things like that in office settings all the time.

Even more insidiously, I wonder if people will lose out on jobs their jobs due to their political affiliations ,sexual orientation, religious affiliation (or lake thereof), etc. I mean, I know they do already - and one could argue that in the long run your better off not being employed by someone who would do such a thing - but I think the issue here could be more than just pics of you having a "cuh-razy" time.

But, all that said, it's not that hard make your account private.

As for other people's pictures of you, if you're that concerned, I think just untagging yourself would solve the problem.

[morosco]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:08pm

The Always Up-to-Date Guide to Managing Your Facebook Privacy

[EVIE]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:16pm

Ugh I HATE this! I don't even have a Facebook thing but everyone else in my life does and there are pics of me (thank God none of drunken behavior) all over...they should have to get your written consent to post your pics up there!

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:33pm

Have you asked them not to post them and/or take down the ones they have?

[MotorTink]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:40pm

while I totally understand, if you are not on facebook there is no way to tag you in those photos, so while they are out there, and that could suck, they should not show up under any web search of your name.

I have a strict policy with my friends of we can post photos (using judegement) but that no one is to tag anyone. If someone wants to be tagged in the photo, they can do it themselves.

I have two accounts, my personal and a work experiment one. I, once a month, try to view my personal account through the other one and make sure everything is private and not viewable.

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:44pm

Eris, your friend was told that was the reason she wasn't hired? Or did you have inside information that she didn't have?

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:48pm

I'd recommend that if you have an old Friendster account to just delete the damn thing. Every time I google my name my long-defunct Friendster account gets attached to all sorts of urls that I've never posted on, I guess because it pulls words in the profile and attaches them to others? If you google my name eventually you'll find a link titled "Sex in Evanston, IL." I've never even LIVED in Evanston!

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:50pm

To be fair, Phyllis, that link doesn't say you "lived" there.

Posted: 6/21/11 at 4:54pm

It sounds like while Phyllis never lived in Evanston he certainly LIVED there.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 6/21/11 at 5:00pm

I have never had sex in Evanston, either!

Also, we when you google my name and hit "images" this is one of the ones that comes up.



My internet trail is very, very strange.

[chewy5000]

Posted: 6/22/11 at 9:37am

Mine comes up with pictures of boats
Updated On: 6/22/11 at 09:37 AM

[Eris0303]

Posted: 6/22/11 at 12:22pm

Eris, your friend was told that was the reason she wasn't hired? Or did you have inside information that she didn't have?

She was told. I only knew about it because she told me.

This is what pops up when I enter my name in google images: