Slashdot Mirror
Employer Demands Facebook Login From Job Applicants
Hugh Pickens writes writes "Alex Madrigal reports in the Atlantic that the ACLU has taken up the case of Maryland corrections officer Robert Collins, who was required to provide his Facebook login and password to the Maryland Division of Corrections during a recertification interview so the interviewer could log on to his account and read not only his postings, but those of his family and friends too. 'We live in a time when national security is the highest priority, but it must be delicately balanced with personal privacy,' says Collins. 'My fellow officers and I should not have to allow the government to view our personal Facebook posts and those of our friends, just to keep our jobs.' The ACLU of Maryland has sent a letter to Public Safety Secretary Gary Maynard (PDF) concerning the Division of Correction's blanket requirement that applicants for employment with the division, as well as current employees undergoing recertification, provide the government with their social media account usernames and personal passwords for use in employee background checks. After three weeks the ACLU has received no response."
A friend of mine just told me that after he clicked on a link to look at a bit of hardware we are thinking of purchasing, his facebook page showed an ad for the same product. They are already watching everything you do. They'd beam ads into your brain with gamma radiation if they thought it would work. People think Facebook is private, and they are wrong, of course, but intrusions like this into a perceived private space are becoming more and more unconscionable. Slashdot lets the "good" users opt out of ads. When will FB do this? Personally I don't care because I can't stand the forced-socialization websites, with or without ads. (Facebook's pet races are rigged, by the way, lousy stink hole that it is.)
Facebook is a fad that will die soon, like all others. Some new "cyber-candy to lull the ignorant masses" will be along soon enough. Then all of you kids who use "The Facebook" can splatter the pedantic, mindless minutia that is your life all over this new thing.