Invasion of Privacy
I’ve been reading a lot about how certain employers are asking potential, and current, employees for their facebook log in info. So far it seem to mostly be government agencies and big companies. The main excuse given for this is that they want to read your messages, look at your wall, check out your photos and see who all your friends are, because they want to make sure you are not affiliated with a gang, or involved in some other criminal activity. These actions not only violate the privacy of the potential employee, but of their facebook friends as well. They have completer access to your account, and want to look at private messages friends send you, and they want to look at your friends, possibly private, pages.
A few people have said, “If you have nothing to hide, then it shouldn’t be a big deal.” It has nothing to do with having something to hide, it’s about simple rights and privacy. There is nothing wrong with wanting to keep your personal life private. Also, as I’ve already mentioned, if you go along with handing over your log in info then you are letting your friends privacy be violated, without their permission or knowledge. I’m one of many people who have used facebook as a tool to find old friends, classmates and long lost family members. I use it to keep in touch with people who I now live long distance from. The messages that have gone back and forth between me and some of these people are personal, they are meant to be private, and are certainly not the business of an employer. As far as what’s on my wall; sometimes I post about places I am going, about my favorite shows, things I want, random silly videos, etc. Even though I really don’t post about anything very interesting, or revealing, I still like to keep my wall posts to ‘friends only’, and it’s my right to do that. Period. The general public can view certain things on my page, like some of my interests (movies, TV, books, etc), and my profile pictures. That is all I care to make public, so if a potential employer wants to see my page that is all they will get.
Then there’s the other issue of an employer using info on your page to discriminate against you. For example, if you have your religion and political views on your page, etc, and this employer does not like what they see, then that could very well prejudice them against you. You really have no idea what they might not like, something you think is simple and innocent, they might view completely differently than you. Is that what they should base their decision on? No, and they can get sued for doing it, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen.
Bottom line: If you let them get away with this, then what is next? Giving them the log in info for your personal email accounts? Handing over your personal cell phone so they can see your phone log and text messages? Letting them open and go through your postal mail? A key to your house? Giving them your bank info so they can make sure you don’t have any suspicious transactions? You would not find any of those things acceptable, and facebook should not be treated any differently.
