Employers Banned From Asking For Social Media Passwords In California

http://techcrunch.com/2012/09/27/employers-banned-from-asking-for-social-media-passwords-in-california/

by iProject • 14 years ago

181 82 14 years ago

khuey• 14 years ago

Watching society deal with the fallout of social media over the years ahead is going to be interesting, if nothing else.

w00kie2• 14 years ago

Next time I interview someone for a position at my company, I'm going to ask them for their Facebook password. If they give it to me, they will be automatically disqualified from the hiring process for lack of common sense.

krichman• 14 years ago

I think (hope) some people are just so desperate for work they'll suffer indignities like that in order to have it.

ataggart4• 14 years ago

In a similar vein, it's not clear to me why I should be deprived of the knowledge that a potential future employer is a privacy-invading jerk. The censor not only infringes on the rights of the speaker, but also the rights of the would-be listeners.

prophetjohn2• 14 years ago

I don't think this is much better. I wouldn't work for someone who asked me this question, even if this were the rationale. Who knows why someone would divulge their password. I bet there are reasons other than being completely devoid of common sense.

Regardless, I bet that any predictive relationship between willingness to divulge a Facebook password in an interview and the ability to perform adequately as a software engineer is weak at best. To me, an employer who doesn't understand that shows poor capacity for unbiased reasoning.

mortenjorck• 14 years ago

If I were interviewing a candidate and had decided to ask this question, my response following their reaction would be "Just kidding. We don't do that here" followed by taking note of how concerned they initially appeared at the question.

sliverstorm2• 14 years ago

I bet there are reasons other than being completely devoid of common sense.

Easy examples off the top of my head:

- You cultivate a profile almost like a garden, knowing that one day an employer is going to demand to see it

- You started one, but don't use it

kenko• 14 years ago

"Who knows why someone would divulge their password. I bet there are reasons other than being completely devoid of common sense."

You need a job and are given to believe that you won't get the one you're interviewing for if you don't hand over your password.

People regularly do all kinds of demeaning things because employers ask/demand them to.

davidwen• 14 years ago

And if they don't? They'll probably disqualify you as a potential employer for asking such a question. Just doesn't seem like anyone wins from this.

tomrod• 14 years ago

"Aw shocks, I seem to have forgotten my password since I haven't logged in since 2007. Can I use your account instead?"

davyjones• 14 years ago

This might backfire on you because if the person you want to hire has a similar line of thought, he/she wouldn't want to work at your company.

w00kie2• 14 years ago

Well, for one, this was kind of a sarcastic comment. Second, if I really did this, once the interviewee refuses to give out the password I would congratulate them, saying they passed my test of modern technological common sense: "never EVER give out your password to anyone for any reason".

Zenst• 14 years ago

How does your logic apply if the don't have a Facebook account?

What if your prospective employee asked you to sign a NDA with regards to any personal information he may or may not reveal, before the interview started. How would you view them then?

Reason I ask is there be companies that will find away around law's and will ask you to sign a NDA during the interview stages and this is accepted in general. Does focus the aspect of what happens at work stays at work and what happens at home stays at home, somewhat.

mkup• 14 years ago

Can NDA overrule the law? For example, can burglar who broke into your house force you to sign NDA so you don't report this case to the police? IANAL, but probably law doesn't work that way; burglary is still a crime regardless of NDAs, and asking for Facebook password at the interview is a violation of law too, no matter what any kind of contract says.

mikegirouard• 14 years ago

Wait… so this really happens?

ataggart4• 14 years ago

No. But politicians won't let manufactured outrage go to waste.

jonursenbach2• 14 years ago

Actually it did happen to my sister.

eli8• 14 years ago

I don't think it was ever widespread, but sure, it happened in a handful of places.

http://www.aclu.org/blog/technology-and-liberty/want-job-pas...

http://www.govtech.com/policy-management/Montana-City-Asks-J...

ataggart4• 14 years ago

How interesting that in both of those incidents, the employer was a government agency.

simonsarris• 14 years ago

I don't understand how it could possibly be legal in the first place since it gives away information that they are not allowed to ask for, such as marital status and sexual orientation.

Wouldn't it be equivalent to divulging that and so much more?

eli8• 14 years ago

IANAL, but it's actually not illegal to ask about marital status. It's just illegal to discriminate based on martial status and if you ever landed in court, you might have a tough time explaining why you asked that question if it didn't affect the hiring decision.

Likewise asking for social media password is pretty dangerous even if it's not specifically illegal because it opens you up to claims that you found something on the account that revealed some protected class status.

(And, sadly, Title VII, the federal anti-discrimination law, does not protect against sexual orientation. In many states it is perfectly legal to fire people for being gay. A bill to fix this situation has been stalled in Congress for nearly two decades.)

milesokeefe• 14 years ago

At least in Texas, it's illegal just to ask, as long as the interviewee did not bring the topic up.

lifeisstillgood2• 14 years ago

Legal to fire people for being gay? Seriously? Any examples?

blerrrgh• 14 years ago

When I first heard that employers were doing this; this demanding of social media passwords... I remember... I-- I-- I cried, I wept like some grandmother. I wanted to tear my teeth out. I didn't know what I wanted to do! And I want to remember it. I never want to forget it... I never want to forget. And then I realized... like I was shot... like I was shot with a diamond... a diamond bullet. Right through my forehead. And I thought... my God... the genius of that! The genius! The will to do that! Perfect, genuine, complete, crystalline, pure. And then I realized they... were stronger than we.

Seriously. This whole idea was the brink of draconian tyranny. When things like this started transpiring five and ten years ago, I immediately withdrew from ALL social media websites, and vowed never to abide by real identity demands on any social website that intended to publish it publicly.

I swore to myself that I would debate any rotten hiring goon into the ground, if I was ever asked such a question during an interview. Not that I would even want to stay on at such a work place, but just to see if they were smart enough to tolerate my brand of dissent. If inflexible, I would instantly walk out, and threaten (an empty threat) to sue.

It's not just about the invasion of privacy an and employers pervasive, stifling surveillance of subordinates. What integrity is there to a Facebook account? Nothing more than an e-mail address is required to create one. E-mail addresses are free and plentiful. More e-mail addresses could potentially be created than addresses in the entire IPv6 number space, and by corollary, so too with social media accounts.

What recourse is there for me to prevent malicious individuals from continually creating fake accounts in my name? Do I have endlessly deep pockets and the spare time it takes to chase down trolls, sue for libel and slander? But how many people have the time to spam and flood the internet with anything they want? What's to stop even me for creating 10,000 fake accounts in my own name? And in doing so, would I forfeit my chances at certain jobs? What absolute twaddle.

sliverstorm2• 14 years ago

try-hard much?

eli8• 14 years ago

TC implies this is the first state to pass such a law. It's already specifically illegal in Maryland and Illinois, and laws are planned in many other states http://www.ncsl.org/issues-research/telecom/employer-access-...

tisme• 14 years ago

Just banned from doing it? That's way too mild. Those employer that were caught doing this should be fined and/or disbanded. If they think they have the right to ask for social media passwords what other rights do they think they have? This is a very severe breach of privacy by an employer.

eurleif• 14 years ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_post_facto_law

geon• 14 years ago

It was already a proof of bad judgement before it became illegal.

davidandgoliath• 14 years ago

I'm disheartened bans like this even need to happen in the first place -- companies should really reconsider hiring anyone they'd feel like they have to ask this sort of stuff to in the first place (Conversely, any company that ask this sort of stuff of their teammates should be places you should avoid working for).

ef4• 14 years ago

I seriously doubt these bans do need to happen.

All it takes is one person to sue for discrimination because their profile says they're gay / disabled / pregnant / a veteran / etc, and the employer has no way of proving that wasn't the reason for passing them over.

This is the same reason smart employers will never ask you questions about those topics in an interview. It's too hard to defend accusations of discrimination if you happen to discover that the candidate is in a legally protected class.

nostromo• 14 years ago

I was curious about how they defined "social media" and it actually seems quite broad (http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billHistoryClient.xh...):

"As used in this chapter, “social media” means an electronic service or account, or electronic content, including, but not limited to, videos, still photographs, blogs, video blogs, podcasts, instant and text messages, email, online services or accounts, or Internet Web site profiles or locations."

simonw• 14 years ago

"online services or accounts"

That's actually a little tricky when it comes to SaaS - if an employee set up the PagerDuty / S3 / Basecamp / what-have-you account under their own name it might be slightly awkward to take the account over should they leave the company.

Not a huge deal - with discipline, those services should be set up using a company-specific account - but it does suggest that SaaS services should make sure they provide a "transfer this to another user" feature.

mseebach3• 14 years ago

I'm sure some lawyers will be happy to draft yet another section to your already long and incomprehensible employment contract to deal with this situation.

And even more happy to draw a lawsuit out for months when a disgruntled ex-employee refuses to hand over the password for such a service with reference to this law.

But, hey, there are several single pieces of anecdotal evidence, certainly it's irrelevant that it's election season, so all is good.

recoiledsnake• 14 years ago

The federal version was voted down in the House by the Republicans.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/27/facebook-password-p...

Daishiman• 14 years ago

Yay for worker's rights.

jebblue• 14 years ago

I'm flat against businesses asking for passwords, the very idea is so absurd I can't believe it exists.

That said, while workers have rights so do employers (this is not one of them) but being able to run your business without being unfairly accused of something seems to be what the reps where arguing against; specifically that what the dems proposed would have enabled the FCC to overreach their authority. Or are you like a big fan of the FCC having even more power?

TazeTSchnitzel2• 14 years ago

I wonder if that's related to their recent strategy of "don't pass anything".

webjunkie• 14 years ago

Or if that's related to "less government". Or "freedom works", which in this context reads ironic.

anamax2• 14 years ago

They've passed more budgets and jobs bills than the Senate has. They've also had more votes on such things than the Senate. (And no, filibusters/cloture doesn't account for the difference.)

The Dem position was stated by Treasury Secretary Geitner - "No, we don't have a plan. We just know that we don't like yours."

perfunctory• 14 years ago

This whole situation with facebook passwords shows the difference between the states and Europe, imho. I have hard time imagining European companies asking for a facebook password. Whether it's legal or not.

reinhardt• 14 years ago

Indeed, as a European this sounds unreal. Might as well ban employers for suggesting sexual favors to prospective employees and interns.

wycats• 14 years ago

It's actually somewhat out of character for the US too. The first time I heard about it, it didn't seem real to me.

keithpeter2• 14 years ago

UK: Yup, this sounds absolutely planet zog. People do get themselves into trouble through facebook, twitter and blogging (see below), but employers don't ask for passwords, that is for sure.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-15347868

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2005/jan/12/books.newme...

(the chap was later re-employed)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19010842

I just tell students that social media are 'public speech' and that they have to think...

The US patents system seems pretty odd as well mind you.

vidarh• 14 years ago

> (the chap was later re-employed)

Actually, he was offered his job back, but didn't take it up. It's unclear if the offer was before or after he won an appeal against Waterstone's dismissal (it is not unusual to get an offer for reinstatement but still run the employment tribunal process to win compensation for the dismissal). But in the meantime he'd gotten an offer from Forbidden Planet to run their blog, and apparently reached a settlement with Waterstone's instead.

As far as I can tell, he still runs the Forbidden Planets blog (as well as his own at http://www.woolamaloo.org.uk/ ).

rmc2• 14 years ago

It is almost certainly illegal in the European Union.

The EU Data Protection (i.e. privacy) law means that if you're collecting personal information (in any way, not just computer), then you have to:

(a) Explain why you are asking for it, and you have to give a legitimate reason why you want to know it. You cannot store information you cannot explain why you need it

(b) You then have to store the personal information in a secure manner. So you can just ask for access to someone's Facebook account and then share it around the office.

(c) The personal data requested must be proportionate to what you want to do. I doubt "tell us everything about your social life" is acceptable for just hiring a person for a job.

(there might be other reasons why this is against data protection law, but I can't think of any off the top of my head)

Not to mention the much stronger employee rights (e.g. you cannot not hire someone based on family status, sexuality, etc.), and it would be much harder to prove you didn't use that information if you accessed it. (Employee protection is stronger in EU, none of this "at will" crap)

eli8• 14 years ago

It was pretty shocking in the States too -- google around for the coverage. It just wasn't always specifically illegal.

eli_gottlieb• 14 years ago

Even in the worker-hating, employer-loving USA, it's relatively uncommon. As many have posted here on Hacker News, actually looking at an employee's social network account (other than, maybe, LinkedIn) can open up all kinds of liabilities for discrimination lawsuits.

So banning the practice really just serves to codify what anyone with common sense was working out in their head anyway.

rada2• 14 years ago

As far as I know - and a quick google search confirms this - it is typical for a European resume/CV/job application to include the applicant's age, marital status, number of children, and even a photo (race/ethnicity).

(Not certain if your post implied that European companies are more privacy-minded, just wanted to point out that that's debatable).

viraptor• 14 years ago

There are no typical European CVs. Every country will have its own style.You won't see any pictures in the UK for example, but it's still not uncommon to see one in PL.

pbreit• 14 years ago

How many people have actually been asked to reveal any personal password to a prospective employer? Is it more than zero?

bencoder• 14 years ago

Reminds me of this resignation letter.. apparently it's fictional, I remembered it being genuine, but the point it raises is valid I believe: http://raganwald.posterous.com/i-hereby-resign

raganwald• 14 years ago

For obvious reasons, I remember that blog post very well. There was quite the discussion about that here on HN:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3790378

Re-reading those comments is very interesting in the context of this legislation.

rmc2• 14 years ago

A good step forward, however it would be better to have a generic data protection/privacy law, (like EU Data Protection Directive) that goes beyond just "employeers asking for social media passwords"

Ntrails• 14 years ago

Wouldn't it make more sense to just send a friend request to candidates 2-3 weeks ahead of the interview?

I mean, if you want to see facebook/timeline information - that's the simplest way (assuming they even have non-public profiles to start with). Twitter is pretty much open season.

makmanalp• 14 years ago

Hey, why don't we make a list of employers who ask for social media passwords? That'll keep them from getting decent employees for a while.

Employers Banned From Asking For Social Media Passwords In California

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