Companies have long used criminal background checks, credit reports and even searches on Google and LinkedIn to probe the previous lives of prospective employees. Now, some companies are requiring job candidates to also pass a social media background check.
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A year-old start-up, Social Intelligence, scrapes the Internet for everything prospective employees may have said or done online in the past seven years.
Then it assembles a dossier with examples of professional honors and charitable work, along with negative information that meets specific criteria: online evidence of racist remarks; references to drugs; sexually explicit photos, text messages or videos; flagrant displays of weapons or bombs and clearly identifiable violent activity.
“We are not detectives,” said Max Drucker, chief executive of the company, which is based in Santa Barbara, Calif. “All we assemble is what is publicly available on the Internet today.”
The Federal Trade Commission, after initially raising concerns last fall about Social Intelligence’s business, determined the company is in compliance with the Fair Credit Reporting Act, but the service still alarms privacy advocates who say that it invites employers to look at information that may not be relevant to job performance.
And what relevant unflattering information has led to job offers being withdrawn or not made? Mr. Drucker said that one prospective employee was found using Craigslist to look for OxyContin. A woman posing naked in photos she put up on an image-sharing site didn’t get the job offer she was seeking at a hospital.
Other background reports have turned up examples of people making anti-Semitic comments and racist remarks, he said. Then there was the job applicant who belonged to a Facebook group, “This Is America. I Shouldn’t Have to Press 1 for English.” This raises a question. “Does that mean you don’t like people who don’t speak English?” asked Mr. Drucker rhetorically.
(read the rest of the article here)
(or here if NYT's paywall kicks in later)
One of our clients had fire a consultant I hired for them because of that.
On his - open to public - FB page, he was badmouthing his coworkers, talking porn, etc
Dumbass (and he is an IT consultant)
On top of that, during his breaks at the office, he was browsing U.S online guns stores
Last edited by lefty; 07-21-2011 at 01:31 PM.
I love it!
This is ed up. Pego already enough trouble with his driving record, imagine if potential employers could see him scoffing babies.
lol using your real info on facebook.
So this sucks, my comments here are generally not incriminating, but I can make juvenile comments every once in a while just like anyone else. The way I read the article leads me to believe that a site like this is also something they are able to include (somehow able find out who you are...). I am extremely careful on FB, I won't even post minor complaints about my job there, but since this isn't my name I am a bit freer here.
HEY! Don't badmouth Pegs!
Stop it!
Stop it!
How the could they possibly find out they I am thispego on sourstalk? Really?
Mike, calm down.
Honestly it could only help me
We are not detectives. We just do exactly what a detective would do, using the internet.
Yeah. People don't seem to realize your eThumbprint is harder to wipe away than actual thumbprints. I rarely use my real name for anything online and I have numerous email accounts for certain things. I also don't use the same screen names for other forums. Ahem.
Holy , so next interview they're going to bring up my comment about how the Casey Anthony jurors pulled off an amazing trolljob on dumb cable news junkies? So this Social Intelligence company is going to put the sheeny curse on me, or what?
I hate it when this happens. Thank God I only have one screen name.
This has been going on for a while now. People don't realize that what they do and say on the Internet is not anonymous, especially when you're doing it on a Facebook account with your name and pics on it. This is one reason why once Myspace went downhill, I deleted my account and never made the jump to Facebook. I just didn't see the point, plus I knew that anything posted by me or my friends was visible to my employers both present and future.
Same goes for YouTube videos and twitter accounts. I don't say anything offensive on Twitter so I'm not worried. In fact, I don't say much of anything, more of just following people really.
we prefer not to hire stalkers mr.nathan (whispers to coworker- yeah he probably likes to explode them too)
This is going way too far. What you do in your private life should have no bearing on your job, unless you're engaging in criminal activity. In fact, I fail to see how a person's credit rating determines their ability to do a job. It's just more ways for companies to discriminate legally.
I would like to see if there is any actuarial science behind this kind of move. I know there is behind the usage of credit scores, but it seems like this kind of information is an attempt to weed people out based on intuitive triggers rather than researched triggers.
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