Social Media Search Component

Overview

A social media search reviews publicly visible content associated with a person, looking for material relevant to a hiring decision. It is the newest component in common use and the one whose practice has changed most in the last decade.

Most of what distinguishes a professional social media screen from an employer searching a candidate’s name is what it is designed to keep out.

What Makes This Component Different

Every other search returns a defined category of information. A criminal search returns criminal records. Social media returns whatever a person has posted, including a great deal an employer has no lawful basis to consider.

That exposure is why the component exists as a screening product at all. A structured search conducted by a third party is a response to the problem created by informal searching, which many employers do without any structure at all.

How a Compliant Search Is Structured

A professional social media screen is built around separating relevant content from protected characteristics.

• A third party conducts the review, so the employer never sees the profile.
• The search is scoped in advance to defined categories, commonly threats or violence, hate speech and discriminatory conduct, sexually explicit material, illegal activity, and disclosure of confidential information.
• Only material within scope is reported. Protected characteristics observed during the review are not passed on.
• Findings are documented with the content and its source, so the individual can respond to something specific.
• The same criteria apply to every candidate for a role.

The employer receives a report of relevant findings rather than a profile. Where nothing within scope is found, the report says so and nothing else.

Public Content Only

A compliant search covers content visible to anyone without logging in, connecting, or being granted access.

Reviewers do not send connection requests, create accounts to gain access, use another person’s credentials, or misrepresent who they are. Content behind a privacy setting is outside the search, and the setting is treated as the boundary.

Whether content was public also matters at the time of review. A post that was public when made and later restricted is not available, and a search reflects what is visible when it runs.

Password and Access Laws

A substantial number of states prohibit employers from requesting social media credentials from applicants or employees. The statutes vary in scope, and many go further than passwords alone.

Common provisions prohibit requesting a username and password, requiring a person to access an account in the employer’s presence, requiring them to add the employer or its agent as a connection, and requiring them to change privacy settings to make content visible.

Several also prohibit retaliating against someone who refuses such a request. Because these statutes are set state by state and differ in scope, the position has to be confirmed for the state where the work is performed.

Off Duty Conduct and Protected Activity

Two further bodies of law limit what may be done with social media content.

Off duty conduct statutes. A number of states protect lawful activity outside work, and some specifically protect lawful use of lawful products. Content showing conduct that is legal and unconnected to the job may fall within those protections.

Protected concerted activity. Federal labor law protects employees discussing wages, hours, and working conditions with each other, and that protection extends to social media. Posts complaining about pay, scheduling, or workplace conditions can be protected activity, and it applies regardless of whether a workplace is unionized.

Political affiliation is protected in some states, and expression that is merely disagreeable is not within the scope of a properly structured search.

Identifying the Right Account

Attributing an account to a person is harder than it looks. Common names produce many accounts, usernames rarely match legal names, and profiles frequently carry no identifying detail beyond a photograph.

Attribution is built from corroborating detail such as employer, location, education, or connections, and an account that cannot be attributed with confidence is not reported. Reporting content from the wrong account attributes someone else’s conduct to the applicant.

What It Does Not Cover

• Private and restricted content.
• Deleted content, which is not visible at the time of review.
• Accounts that cannot be attributed to the person with confidence.
• Protected characteristics, which are excluded from the report by design.
• Criminal records, which come from a county criminal search.
• News coverage, covered on our Adverse Media Search page.

Where It Fits Under the FCRA

A social media report prepared by a screening company for employment purposes is a consumer report. Written disclosure and authorization are required before it is requested, accuracy obligations attach to what is reported, and the individual has the right to dispute anything incorrect. Our FCRA Overview covers those requirements in full.

Where a search extends into information about a person’s character, reputation, or mode of living gathered through interviews, it produces a different category of report with additional disclosure requirements attached.

Where social media content contributes to a decision not to hire, the required notice steps apply. That matters more here than almost anywhere, because the individual may need to establish that an account is not theirs, that content was taken out of context, or that it was posted by someone else. See The Adverse Action Process.

An employer searching a candidate informally, without a screening company, is outside the consumer reporting framework entirely. Discrimination law, state access statutes, and off duty conduct protections all still apply, and the employer has none of the structural protection a scoped third party review provides.