<p>[Inslee</a> signs Facebook job password bill - seattlepi.com](<a href=“http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Inslee-signs-Facebook-job-password-bill-4536506.php]Inslee”>http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Inslee-signs-Facebook-job-password-bill-4536506.php)</p>
<p>The new law forbids potential employers from requiring a prospective employee to give them the passwords for their Facebook, Twitter or other social media accounts. It also forbids them from requiring employees to “friend” their managers.</p>
<p>I know this has come up before on CC, and I know that many of you hire people. What do you think of this? I had to have a background check for my current job, but it certainly didn’t extend to social media. What I do on my own time is my business. Companies can still request that you turn over postings that may compromise company security IF there is reason to suspect you’ve made such postings.</p>
<p>Good job, Jay. I have heard of employers doing this, but I’ve never personally met anyone who was asked to surrender their passwords. This is apparently done to curb social site usage during work hours. What a bunch of nonsense! Most employers who do not want their employees to waste their time simply block all social sites and limit YouTube time to several minutes per day, no passwords needed.</p>
<p>The reasoning that I have heard behind the password requests include the need to get a more complete picture of the potential employee-to see if they engage in risky behavior, have unsavory views, etc. I’ve never heard that it had to do with keeping them off the sites POST employment offer. But I agree with you- companies should just block the sites if they want to limit access. </p>
<p>This is different from what people put out there for public viewing-like the teacher who had a soft porn site who recently got fired-in Florida (?). If I have a public persona and it’s not PW protected, it’s fair game.</p>