Before offering you a job, employers don’t generally ask to “snoop around your underwear drawer and check the cleanliness of your toilet,” said Marni Soupcoff in NationalPost.com. So why do they suddenly want your Facebook password? The Associated Press reported last week that a growing number of job interviewers are demanding access to applicants’ entire Facebook accounts, if those accounts have privacy settings that protect them from Google searches. Applicants’ résumés and references are fair game for scrutiny, said Ty Kiisel in Forbes.com. But their private photo albums, their social circles, and any embarrassing comments they may have posted after a night of drinking should not be. If a job interviewer asks you for your Facebook password, “the answer should not just be no. It should be hell no.”
Sorry, but this is a “nonissue,” said Shel Israel, also in Forbes.com. Some alarmists portray this as an Orwellian trend that’s sweeping the nation, but there’s no evidence that prospective employers are routinely demanding access to Facebook passwords. Most of the cases cited in that AP story involved law-enforcement officials trying to ensure, quite sensibly, that they didn’t hire guards with criminal-gang affiliations. Besides, said Thomas Claburn in InformationWeek.com, is there anyone still under the impression that their Facebook page is truly “private?” Whatever you share on Facebook, or any social media, can be easily obtained by a prosecutor or divorce lawyer, or shared with the world by a disloyal friend or other mischief-maker. “The ‘post’ button, like a diamond, is forever.”
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
