With the increasing popularity of social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook, employers are finding it more easy to conduct free background checks on potential employees.
However, employers who make adverse hiring decisions based on an employee's social networking sites could face potential litigation, according to an article by College Recruiter.
Such a hiring decision could violate state and federal discrimination laws. If an employer decides not to hire someone based on information found on the Internet, they could be accused of stereotyping, for instance, by not hiring people of a certain race or sexual orientation.
Another possibility is the invasion of privacy, which requires a reasonable expectation of privacy, a guarentee most social networking sites don't offer.
"Facebook was intentionally designed to limit the availability of your profile to only your friends and other people on your networks," the article notes. "This simple but important security measure promotes local networking and makes sure that your information is seen by people you want to share it with, and not by people you don't.
"On the other hand, if you are using privacy features that you believe restrict access to very few specific people completely within your control, and an employer somehow hacks past such a privacy barrier, you may have a strong privacy claim," the article continues.
Many social networking sites also issue service claims that prevent the site from being used in a commercial capacity. However, it may be hard to prove an employer wrongly used a social networking site. This also could result in a federal case under the Federal Computer Fraud And Abuse Act.
It also should be remembered the Fair Credit Reporting Act regulates how background checks are conducted, and the use of social networking sites to conduct background checks could go against the law.
