In what is seen as an overly bold move, the city of Bozeman is asking for individuals to list the social networking sites they belong to, as well as the logins and passwords to said accounts.  They also want to read your email as part of their background checks for employment.

The requirement is included on a waiver statement applicants must sign, giving the City permission to conduct an investigation into the person’s “background, references, character, past employment, education, credit history, criminal or police records.”

“Please list any and all, current personal or business websites, web pages or memberships on any Internet-based chat rooms, social clubs or forums, to include, but not limited to: Facebook, Google, Yahoo, YouTube.com, MySpace, etc.,” the City form states. There are then three lines where applicants can list the Web sites, their user names and log-in information and their passwords.

What’s the point in having passwords if you’re going to be required to turn them over every time your employer or potential employer asks for them?

“So, we have positions ranging from fire and police, which require people of high integrity for those positions, all the way down to the lifeguards and the folks that work in city hall here. So we do those types of investigations to make sure the people that we hire have the highest moral character and are a good fit for the City,” Sullivan said.

The police appear to be taking a page out of the idiocy book from the United Kingdom.

No one has ever removed his or her name from consideration for a job due to the request, Sullivan added.

Then those people are idiots.  They are freely allowing the city to invade their privacy in matters where the city should not be prying.  Your activities online are a private matter.  Is the city going to ask applicants what bars or restaurants they hang out in so they can perform checks to make sure they are drinking and eating at the right places?  Are they going to come to your house and inspect your bathroom and medicine cabinets too?

The invasion of privacy issue here has deeper implications.  If you apply for a job, employers cannot ask you about marital status, age, race, religion, and political affiliations.  Most Facebook users have this information.

It is impossible to require this information for a job application and not violate federal law.  It is also illegal and completely unethical for an employer to require such information from a potential employee.  If the city actually uses the logins, then they are violating the ToS of most sites online (see google’s ToS, part 6, for an example) and should be prosecuted for doing so.