On October 1st, the Governor of California Jerry
Brown signed two bills into law that restrict employers and colleges in that
state from asking an applicant or worker for their social network and email
passwords. These laws block the employer
from viewing the highly personal content in the private messages and photos on
Facebook and other online media. These
businesses and colleges would use this access to see an applicant’s true
character when they think no one is watching; a post featuring illegal or
unethical content could cost someone much more than temporary embarrassment, a
job or an education might have been on the line had this law not been passed in
California. Most importantly, however,
these situations blur the line of keeping your work and private life
separate. Your online profile would most
likely go into detail about your religion, sexual orientation, marital status,
and other items that an employer or college cannot inquire about in a
professional setting. With this in mind,
California is absolutely making the right move in the name of privacy.
New law does not protect high school students online
While this new California law protects college students from
being asked for their password, it does not protect younger students, most
likely those in high school, who have an online presence. As children create profiles earlier and
earlier (Facebook is now open to ages 13 and up), this poses a potential
problem in the schools. A particularly bold
teacher or principal might feel empowered to look at a student’s profile, and
there would be no law to stop them. Unfortunately, this happens in today’s
world. Three years ago, a cheerleading coach at Pearl High School in
Mississippi asked her squad for their Facebook passwords. Most of the girls deleted their Facebook
accounts rather than allowing their personal conversations to be viewed, but
Mandi Jackson provided her password to the coach. The coach found some “vulgar
statements” in a private message between Mandi and another student, and “publicly
reprimanded” Mandi at the school. If the
statements had made a threat to the school community, that is an important case
that must be dealt with, but Mandi attests that the statements were typed at
her house and did not have anything to do with the school. At that point, a coach at a high school has
no business in her students’ lives unless they choose to share that information
willingly.
The law is a first step in the right direction
This law has not covered all of the important points that
need to be taken care of, but it is definitely a great start. Blocking colleges and employers from
requesting passwords helps many people, but that same protection needs to be
extended to all users of the social networks where compromising information
might be shared in private. Even though California
colleges are blocked from checking Facebook, scholarship donors still have
access to our online profiles. It has
been reported that 25% of scholarship providers check out finalists online for
bad behavior that could reflect poorly on the donor or to verify information,
and a third of those providers have denied a scholarship based on what they
found online. Until the time when comprehensive laws are passed in California
and other states, social network users must be especially careful of what is
posted of them online, for you never know who might be looking.
Even after that time though, we must be careful. Employers and colleges may not be allowed to
ask for a password, but they can still see what comes up publicly about you. A quick search of your name and high school on
Google may bring up athletic achievements and the school honor roll, but a
Facebook search may bring up your hilarious, but still illegal, picture from a
rogue drunken outing that was probably best left unshared. The key is to
constantly monitor what is posted about you. Keep your postings clean and easily approved by potential important
viewers, and make sure your friends know that it is important to you to keep a
good image online. Also, make sure that you have your privacy settings in order; don't be
part of the whopping 36% of teens or 39% of adults that has a public or
partially public Facebook profile. In the end, we should
all keep ourselves in a position to receive a good first impression, and
future laws to protect that impression will go a long way to help the cause.
