Guidelines on social media background checks from BC’s Privacy Commissioner
Many employers are using social media to screen potential hires. They’ll look at Facebook profiles, Twitter feeds and YouTube videos to get a clearer picture of who a candidate is.
Like it or not, social media screening is becoming a standard recruitment tool for many companies. In the United States, the Federal Trade Commission has decided that the social media researching of individuals by companies – prospective or current employers included – is not a violation of that person’s privacy.
The Information and Privacy Commissioner of British Columbia is proactively addressing the privacy and legal concerns related to these social media background checks and has released guidelines on the practice.
“We enter a new era with the application of privacy laws to social media background checks,” Commission Elizabeth Denham said in a statement. “The guidelines my Office is issuing are designed to provide guidance and practical steps to assist organizations and public bodies in complying with the law.”
Denham’s guidance document addresses a few of the risks associated with social media background checks, including:
Accuracy: Information may be prone to errors, and social media is no exception. Privacy laws require public bodies and organizations to take steps to ensure that the information they collect is accurate.
Collecting irrelevant information or collecting too much information: “Like a dragnet, social media background checks can catch much more than what was intended,” the guidelines say. Individuals performing the checks could collect personal information that might be irrelevant. Under privacy laws, organizations can only collect personal information that a reasonable person would consider appropriate or reasonable in the circumstances.
Overreliance on consent: “It is problematic for public bodies or organizations to rely on consent to perform a social media background check for a number of reasons,” says the document.
Thinking about conducting a social media background check on a person? You may want to consider the following from the Privacy Commissioner:
- Recognize that any information collected about individuals is personal information or personal employee information and is subject to privacy laws, whether or not the information is publicly available online or whether it is online but subject to limited access as a result of privacy settings or other restrictions;
- Conduct a privacy impact assessment including an assessment of the risks associated with your use of social media as a component of background checks. When conducting this assessment, public bodies and organizations should:
a. Find out what privacy law applies and review it, ensuring that there is authority to collect and use personal information;
b. Identify the purposes for using social media to collect personal information;
c. Determine whether the identified purposes for the collection and use of personal information are authorized;
d. Consider and assess other, less intrusive, measures that meet the same purposes;
e. Identify the types and amounts of personal information likely to be collected in the course of a social media background check including collateral personal information about other people that may be inadvertently collected as a result of the social media background check;
f. Identify the risks associated with the collection and use of this personal information including risks resulting from actions taken based on inaccurate information;
g. Ensure that the appropriate policies, procedures and controls are in place to address the risks related to the collection, use, disclosure, retention, accuracy and protection of personal information.
h. If the collection is authorized, notify the individual that you will be performing a social media background check and tell them what you will be checking and what the legal authority is for collecting it;
i. Be prepared to provide access to the information you collected and used to make a decision about an employee or volunteer.
The complete guide is available online. (PDF)
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