Employees Beware: Employers Monitor Twitter, Facebook, Internet Posts

Those photos on Facebook showing you palling around with drunks, the raunchy joke you posted on Twitter, and those links to politically incorrect groups on your personal web site -all of this information can now become part of your job application and employment record.

The practice of employers checking employment, criminal and credit histories of job candidates is apparently no longer sufficient. A California company is helping employers collect information about job candidates and employees from Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and wherever else on the Internet the person may have posted information.

“We not only review the social networks; it’s the two-thirds of user-generated content that doesn’t fall into the category of Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace,” said Max Drucker, co-founder and CEO of Social Intelligence Corp., in an interview with Insurance Journal. “We review blogs. We review bulletin boards. We review the microblogs. We review comments in forums. We really are looking for anything out there, personal web pages, anything out there that a person can create themselves and has posted publicly, into the public domain, online.”

Drucker sees his service as a risk management tool for employers, helping them avoid liability for negligently hiring someone who later turns out to be a real mismatch, or worse. Post-hiring, it helps keep employees in line with a company’s media policy.

Companies are already scanning the Internet for information on job candidates and employees, he says, but they may not be doing so efficiently or thoroughly. What’s more, they may be exposing themselves to liability by identifying information they shouldn’t consider in hiring, such as age, race or religion. Social Intelligence acts as an “arms-length third party” to do the web searching for employers.

After Social Intelligence’s computers comb the Internet for the information, at least three people at the firm review the results, according to Drucker. They black out anything that is irrelevant to the job under consideration or that is illegal for employers to use in hiring such as if someone is pregnant or has a medical condition. If there is an objectionable photo, they describe it to the employer without actually including the photo in the report since that could disclose a person’s race or age.

By blocking certain information, his service benefits job candidates as much as it does employers, Drucker contends.

“We only provide solutions that are about protecting the job applicants from discrimination and, in turn, by doing that, you’re protecting the employers of allegations of discrimination. You’re giving them a fair hiring practice,” he told Insurance Journal.

He says Social Intelligence functions as a consumer reporting agency under the Fair Credit Reporting Act. Thus, he said, anyone who has suffered “adverse actioning”- been fired or not been hired-has a right to a copy of the report and an opportunity to correct any misinformation.

Drucker is surprised at what some people will post to the Internet.

“It’s ridiculous. I mean, we see this stuff all day, every day. People that are applying for jobs, people that have even posted their resumes online, that have these alter egos, doing things that represent them very poorly, and could, in turn, create a lot of risk for that company,” he said.

Social Intelligence is not just interested in embarrassing or negative information. “There’s looking for the objectionable material, but we’re also looking for positive attributes,” he says, citing such things as participation in industry-leading blogs or charitable organizations, or if someone has a lot of Linked-In contacts.

Social Intelligence also offers a service that monitors employees’ use of the Internet and social networks. “It’s critical that their employees adhere to what their media policy is, which is, of course, don’t give company secrets, and don’t talk about the company in this forum or that forum. Don’t have pictures of you doing a thing like shooting or drinking while wearing a company logos,” Drucker said.

Drucker is no stranger to insurance. He previously co-founded an insurance web application company named Steel Card that ChoicePoint acquired. While he thinks insurance firms are prime candidates for use of his services in their hiring, extending the use of Internet monitoring beyond hiring and into underwriting is probably not doable now.

However, what is doable now is using social network and web monitoring for fraud detection, following people who file disability, workers’ compensation and other claims.

“[T]hat’s one of our areas that we are exploring,” he said.

Just as his firm promises to protect employers from being sued, he is well aware his own firm is exposing itself to privacy critics, if not to potential lawsuits, by poking around in individuals’ web spaces.

“Look, all companies need to worry about being sued, at some level, for whatever the reason and we certainly understand that we’re going into a new space that may be treated as controversial,” he said. He hopes that by “making every effort, in every single way, to adhere to all the laws” and by focusing on protecting job applicants, his own firm should be in a safe place.

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