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Maes

What bullshit.... [Employers asking for Facebook password]

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Ha ha, I fooled them. I don't even have a facebook account.

On a more serious note, I like this corollary:

The core assumption here is that your constitutional rights are open to negotiation if you decide you want to work for anybody.

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What bullshit... facebook exists. To bring us all closer to tear us apart. My friend's place of work actually opperates his FB for him and it is really an intern that updates his FB saying whew tough day today, but the tweaks we added to this program make it all worth it.

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Yeah, I read this a couple of weeks ago. I'd close my page before giving them my password.

You risk your business public image the day you hire employees.

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I'd rather not get hired, or get fired, than give up my password. These are not people. Hopefully there'll be a law, though.

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Giving up your password will certainly violate the ToS. It's good to know employers are publicly announcing they'd rather hire people who will break contracts. It'll be great for their image.

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Facebook password? Who cares. Now, Doomworld password, on the other hand...

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Bucket said:

That'll be the day I migrate to Google+.

Then employers will just ask for your Google password instead.

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Technician said:

I think we're at a point where an employer would find it suspisious if you do not have a Facebook page.


Well, you could claim you use some NEW! and ENHANCED!! social media nobody knows about (yet), obscure enough so that it doesn't ring any bells or discourages further investigation (e.g. if they have some data-snitching API built around FB or 2-3 major social media alone, they may consider it a total waste of time bothering with you).

In any case, I don't see the usefulness behind this for average FB users. Someone may deliberately cultivate completely different online personas or even sign on to FB as Random P. Asshole, for all they know, so unless they hire a PI to do some serious investigation about you, they can't expect every random-ass asshole HR manager to turn into a Sherlock Holmes just by using some haphazard data mining bot made by their local IT dungeon.

The only -remotely- useful rationale behind this is hoping to find business secrets (as in the case of geo's buddy's who essentially has a straw man profile, dictated by his employer). But such profiles usually are bound by contracts and agreements, and leaving a company means handing the profile back. There have even been litigations about employees continuing using "personal" profiles which were actually built on company resources and endorsement, after they left a company. Maybe they hope to access such a profile?

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/story/2012-02-23/twitter-account-lawsuit/53229408/1

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You know, I don't even have a problem with companies using facebook information against you. You should be careful what you post online. What bugs me is the glaring security breach in asking someone to disclose personal password information. Suddenly, my formerly secure password is out in the open, and thus, the security of my facebook page is compromised. What if someone unscrupulous who works for the company gets ahold of that password? I mean yeah, it's just facebook, but still... It goes against basic principles of security. I wouldn't feel safe working for a company whose policy is to make private passwords a public matter.

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Sodaholic said:

Then employers will just ask for your Google password instead.

And they'll have access to your Youtube/Gmail/GNews/GReader and Android account! Isn't it beautiful?

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IMO, if you're stupid enough to give out your password for a job or basically anything else, you deserve to have your employer breathing down your neck.

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geekmarine said:

You know, I don't even have a problem with companies using facebook information against you. You should be careful what you post online.

It's not what you post online - it's what your douchebag friends post of you online.

Krispy said:

IMO, if you're stupid enough to give out your password for a job or basically anything else, you deserve to have your employer breathing down your neck.

You do realize jobs are not easy to come by in present times, right? You may be given the opportunity for an above minimum wage job and I wouldn't fault you for selling your soul.

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evilbay (ebay) was toying with the idea of getting seller's email passwords so they can be all totalitarian up in your bidness n shit, making sure there's no anti-ebay communication, making sure everyone is wearing their fake smiles. They already spy on all communication.
OMG, this grocery store called vons, don't shop there because I've heard over the intercom multiple times, "gee, hyuck, all employees in the produce department, time for a customer service huddle' A fucking huddle about customer service, making sure all the employees feel too humuliated and demasculated to live. By the way the employees are 'graded' by 'mystery shoppers' (i worked there a bit too). You never know if a customer is part of the mystery shopper secret service grading the size of your fake smile. When you shop there you can find new hires that are all extremely overly 'hi how are you today!!'; they say that out of fear and brainwashing, its not real politeness. I worked at target for christmas once and I'm pretty sure they made their employees do morning exercises or some shit. The doors were locked so the night crew can't leave. Foxconn worldwide.
It feels like the economy is being intentionally imploded. All entrepreneur niches being stamped out to heard everyone into shit gears of multinational mega corporations. Its open season on the individual. Its an occupied nation with a coup d'état by corporations.
Luckily I smelled the general web 2.0edness of facebook and twitter et al. from day 1 and never signed up.
Just like television shows (and movies) smell like weird intentionally dumbing down propaganda:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSWmERAAooQ
I just watched an episode of 'how i met your mother' because it was really advertised/spammed making me suspect it was crap. The main character is a BANKER, lol. In the episode they went to find the 'best burger', repeatedly throwing hamburgers on the ground with no respect for the factory farm slave animals that created it.
and it seems like they're 'installing' political people as actors so they get a lot of fame, possibly george clooney and Angelina Jolie who were all pro kony 2012 or something I think.

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It's bullshit alright and an invasion of privacy, it's also the sort of thing employers can get away with when the job market's tight. Facebook passwords aren't an issue for me since I don't have an account, but if the request was made I'd be asking myself if I really want to work for these people.

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Technician said:

You do realize jobs are not easy to come by in present times, right? You may be given the opportunity for an above minimum wage job and I wouldn't fault you for selling your soul.


I suppose you're right. But this is why people need to unionize. It solves lots of problems like this.

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Krispy said:

I suppose you're right. But this is why people need to unionize. It solves lots of problems like this.

As much as I support unions, most unions need a reform too. I think they're paying over thirty bucks an hour at my local Honda. No wonder car corporations are moving production to other countries.

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You have every right not to give employers your password, and they have every right not to hire you. The solution is actually get some skills that are in demand so that they come crawling to you, not the other way around.

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AndrewB said:

You have every right not to give employers your password, and they have every right not to hire you. The solution is actually get some skills that are in demand so that they come crawling to you, not the other way around.

Yeah, but there are currently more educated people then jobs requiring post-secondary graduates. Sometimes you can't pass up an opportunity to apply your education in real life and pay back your student loans.

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What next, employers demanding your pin number and credit card details? Login details of every other site you visit? A log of everything you do, everywhere you go and everything you say when not at work?

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Why not! If employees are prepared to embrace economic feudalism, might as well go all the way.

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Technician said:

As much as I support unions, most unions need a reform too. I think they're paying over thirty bucks an hour at my local Honda. No wonder car corporations are moving production to other countries.


It's true.

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DoomUK said:

What next, employers demanding your pin number and credit card details? Login details of every other site you visit? A log of everything you do, everywhere you go and everything you say when not at work?


For certain categories of workers (public sector, military, police, sensitive positions etc.) all of the above are standard practice, to a degree, although maybe not to the point of personal banking details (but if the state is paying you and taxing you, they know pretty damn well what goes in and what goes out). Your conduct when off-duty may also count against you, especially if military/teacher/minister etc.

It was also the de-facto situation in Communist countries: since every company/employer would be the state or work for the state, they were required to keep tabs and spy on everyone, and what better way to do that than having people spending most of their time on your company's/factory's premises, where they can be snitched/monitored etc.? Getting work also required you to be a member of this or that organization, so more opportunities for spying on you.

It's ironic that the capitalist deregulation and "voluntary" submission of personal information through traps such as social media etc. has went to such extremes as to resemble the almost total regulation and adamant surveillance present in communist regimes, only that the main power is not the central state, but any sufficiently large corporation. At least with communists you were fully informed that you had no freedoms right from the start, while modern capitalism is moving the goalposts.

Only if a new powerful communist state re-appears (China doesn't count) will they back off from such practices, as they did during the Cold War.

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So wait a second, people who use Facebook are concerned about their privacy? Isn't that the biggest oxymoron in the world?

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geekmarine said:

You know, I don't even have a problem with companies using facebook information against you. You should be careful what you post online.


Correct, but "careful" according to which criteria? Just your own? You might be far off and not even realize it. Plain common sense? It might NOT be enough, in certain contexts. Or the criteria that exist in the micro-brain of some Random P. Ass "HR Manager" with extended judgement duties, whose little pettinesses you should be aware of to avoid displeasing him?

Use3D said:

So wait a second, people who use Facebook are concerned about their privacy? Isn't that the biggest oxymoron in the world?


It is, but asking for one's password goes one step beyond. "What you choose to show on your public profile is NOT enough. We want it ALL!".

And, apparently, it's not even a new thing: pre-Cold War, even US industries (Ford, in particular) used to have PIs and a network of snitches/informants checking on their employees:

Ford Motor Company's Sociological Department

I guess you're lucky (?) that employers have to ask you upfront for that FB password, after all: the whole thing could simply be backdoored for unlimited access by the state/employers etc. without asking you for a damn thing. And I wouldn't be surprised if future social media are required to include just that: after all, traditional phone networks, including mobile "encrypted" GSM/CDMA etc. ones are open to full scrutiny by the government, something that is required by design otherwise there would be no fucking way they'd ever get a license to operate.

Once again, it wasn't until the USSR became a threat that Western labor practices softened up, presumably to make them look "better" than what the Bad Commies were doing. With these out of the way though, there's once again, no stopping them.

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Maes said:

Only if a new powerful communist state re-appears (China doesn't count) will they back off from such practices, as they did during the Cold War.

Does the counterbalance have to be communist or would a totalitarian capitalist EU suffice? As for American corporations developing a new-found respect for the rights of individuals, that won't happen without government regulation and neither party wants to upset major election campaign donors. What you'll more likely see is a shift in corporate and government mindset to "proles with secrets are a threat to society and possibly enemy agents".

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