Identity Theft Protection Blog

By the AllClear ID team

Vanessa here from AllClear ID.  The next time you apply for a job, don’t be surprised if you have to agree to a social media background check. Many U.S. companies and recruiters are now looking at your Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, blogs, YouTube videos and other accounts to see who you really are.

Even the Federal Trade Commission has weighed in, deciding that companies that research how you spend your personal time, and what your hobbies are, don’t violate your privacy.

HR experts say you can breathe easy when it comes to party pictures on your Facebook page — most employers and recruiters look past them (unless, you’re underage, obviously). What they’re looking for are your approach to what you put online. Is it immature, inappropriate? Will the comments and opinions you’re giving to the public jive with what you’ll do with clients and peers?

Here are our tips for creating an employer-friendly profile on the Internet:

• Find out what’s out there online about you. Anything that may be taken out of context should be taken down.
• Go beyond Facebook and Flickr — remember that bits and pieces of you are at a number of other sites, like LinkedIn, Craigslist and Foursquare, not to mention blogs, forums and wikis that you might visit.
• Do frequent checks on your privacy settings on social-media accounts.
• Create a positive online presence by putting up your résumé on a site with your domain name, or getting it on forums of charitable organizations that you support.
• If you really want to get serious about your online profile, consider hiring an “online reputation management company” like Reputation.com and Unsubscribe.com to help you present a better you to the world.