I saw some news stories that have bothered me a little bit. For those of you who know me well, you know that I value privacy a great deal. Apparently, recently some employers have started asking interviewees for their Facebook login information.

This brings up several legal issues, and I think that there will end up being some legislation regarding this issue. In the meantime, in a shaky economy, it puts job seekers in a tight spot. Let me be clear. As far as I’m concerned, employers do not have the right to ask you for your user ID and password to anything, email or social networking site. However, not every job applicant has the luxury to refuse.

As an alternative, some employers want applicants to accept friend requests from the human resources department or want applicants to log in to their accounts and pull up their profiles during the interview. I’m also against this. I understand the need for employers to find employees who are trustworthy and who will be beneficial to their company. I also stress to my students that whatever goes on the Internet is there and can found, and depending on what it is, it could hurt them in the future. However, that doesn’t give employers the right to invade privacy, and an applicant shouldn’t have to choose between feeding his/her family and protecting his/her privacy.

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If a profile is public, it’s just that … public. Anybody can see it. If it’s private, it’s just that … private. You get to choose who sees it. Just because you don’t want someone to see it does not mean you have something to hide. Look at it this way. Do you let everybody you know enter your house? Do you let general acquaintances just enter your house? Do you let complete strangers enter your house? Overall, we are picky about who we invite into our homes, not because we have something to hide but because we want our privacy. The same rule applies to our social networking sites.

We have friends because we choose to have those folks as friends. If someone forces you to accept a friend request, that’s akin to forcing their way into your home. There are a lot of people out there with their profiles set to public, and there are a lot of people who will accept complete strangers as their friends. That’s not the smartest thing to do, but it’s their right to do it. For those who choose to set their profiles to private and who choose to be selective in choosing their friends, they, too, are only exercising their right to privacy.

Employers can require criminal background checks and drug testing for their employees. However, demanding access to a private profile is an invasion of privacy. I’m a believer in the “give them an inch, they’ll take a mile” philosophy, and if employers are allowed to violate privacy in this way, then how long until they can take a tour of your home before they decide whether to hire you? As always, I’ll admit, that might be a stretch, but I don’t accept the idea that it would be an impossible stretch.

Yes, what you put on the Internet will always be there, somewhere. Yes, it can come back to haunt you. Yes, employers want the best employees they can find. However, employers should not be allowed to violate privacy in order to find that employee.