A Thousand Eyes and An Unforgiving Memory
Now, more than ever, we need to be aware of the old saying that you just can’t be too careful.
A recent article in the business section of the Washington Post tells the story of two well-qualified job seekers who were finalists for the same position. One eventually lost out because of questionable photos the employer found posted on Facebook. And here’s the kicker: the pictures were found not on the account of the job seeker himself but rather on that of a friend of his who had not enabled his privacy settings.
Was this legal? The information was publicly accessible, so, yes, it’s perfectly legal. In fact, the article recalls a December 2009 survey that showed that 75 percent of recruiters say their bosses now require them to conduct online researches of job applicants, in part because they are quicker and easier, not to mention more revealing, than talking to an applicant’s references.
Even if you enable all the right privacy settings, even if you eventually delete your Facebook account, even if you yourself never had an account to begin with, the pronouncements and photographs posted on Facebook — not to mention your blog posts, Twitter tweets, YouTube videos, even emails — are still stored somewhere, as are the things your “friends” have posted that might include you or make reference to you, such as a tagged photo.
You might forget. Your friends might. But the Web never forgets. These days, you can really never be too careful.