Facebook follows the news just like you do. And it’s been paying attention to the weird and worrying new trend that employers have asked prospective employees for their Facebook passwords during the hiring process.
Today, Facebook, in the name of “protecting your passwords and privacy,” has made it a violation of its Statement of Rights and Responsibilities to “share or solicit a Facebook password.”
“We don’t think employers should be asking prospective employees to provide their passwords because we don’t think it’s right the thing to do,” Erin Egan, Facebook’s Chief Privacy Officer,explains. “But it also may cause problems for the employers that they are not anticipating. For example, if an employer sees on Facebook that someone is a member of a protected group (e.g. over a certain age, etc.) that employer may open themselves up to claims of discrimination if they don’t hire that person.”
