# Googling Job interviewers redux **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 22, 2004, 11:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/googling-job-interviewers-redux/246505 "2004-05-22T11:05:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2004, 11:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/googling-job-interviewers-redux/246505/1 "2004-05-22T11:05:45Z")
In [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=257391) (now locked) there was a discussion about whether it would be ethical for a employer to google a job interview applicant to find out more about them. I want to take this on a slightly different tack: - I put a page on the front of my blog with all my personal stuff in it, a disclaimer saying “Only click the “enter site” button if you are not in any way professional or personally associated with \ or \”. Would it now be ethical to look anyway? - I have a fair suspicion that my employer is going to google my name so I go ahead and create a series of fictional blog accounts detailing what a good guy I am. I even go so far as to create a fictional company which “accidentally” leaves all it’s employee evaluation forms accessible to the web and I give myself glowing review after glowing review. Assume for the moment that there is no case of mistaken identity because my name is sufficiently uncommon. ---
**Author:** ![iamme99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@iamme99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamme99)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2004, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/googling-job-interviewers-redux/246505/2 "2004-05-22T11:34:09Z")
You ask about ETHICS from an American company? Puh-leeze… Your plan might fool your average company or PI but that is all. I assume that not only employers, but others, such as the FBI/CIA/NSA regularly review and perhaps capture and link together posts found on the net. I recognized this exposure long ago, so have never used my real name on any web postings I have ever done. That keeps most companies and people out of my business. The government, however, has ways and means (both legal and illegal) to trace anything written non-anonymosly back to the poster. Real privacy is difficult to maintain in today’s world. ---
**Author:** ![raindog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@raindog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raindog)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2004, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/googling-job-interviewers-redux/246505/3 "2004-05-22T11:39:36Z")
IMO this is not cool. Most employers now do some background checks, and google is just one more source to garner information. I’m self employed and I recently took on some work for a major company and they hire an outside company to do background checks on my company and emplyees. I was surprized just how much information they had; every address I ever lived at, speeding tickets, the whole 9 yards. But that is their policy and their right. I think that a company should put this policy information “up front” to all employees, or potential employees. But if they do, hey, you know what to expect. And your blog is public information, just like the details of your divorce. To create ficticious information to “game” them seems to me to be unethical and deceptive. What they’re doing may be distasteful, but it is not unethical. Even if they were doing something a little shady, like going through your garbage, I still think that 2 wrongs don’t add up to a right. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2004, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/googling-job-interviewers-redux/246505/4 "2004-05-22T15:17:22Z")
I’ve Googled myself (it’s cheap and fun) and every entry related to me (except for the ones about some English guy named “Brian Ekers”), which I guess makes me unique. Now, if a potential employer wants evidence of my Star Trek geekery, the power is in his hands. ---
**Author:** ![iamme99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/57b2e6/32.png) [@iamme99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamme99)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2004, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/googling-job-interviewers-redux/246505/5 "2004-05-23T00:34:37Z")
> [@Bryan Ekers](#): > > I’ve Googled myself (it’s cheap and fun) and every entry related to me (except for the ones about some English guy named “Brian Ekers”), which I guess makes me unique. > > Now, if a potential employer wants evidence of my Star Trek geekery, the power is in his hands. Ha! Just for kicks did a quick scan of some of your postings here. Imagine I was given the task of writing a report up on you. Here is what I found and my conclusions. 😃 > [@](#): > > You read books like Haj by Leon Uris. Based on some comments, you seem to have some interest in politics. You watch SF, Rambo, James Bond and Terminator films and have seen Deliverance. You seem to like movie’s with fights and violence in them. Based on your choice of movies and a comment you made “bleating about violent video games and movies” might indicate that you have an interest in and support violence. You may have a fetish for black cotton ninja underpants. 😉 > > You are a Communications Technician and you owned or currently own a 1990 Camry LE. You run Win/XP. You might not want to run for president given how the above minimal inforamtion could be easily twisted out of context… 😃😃 ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2004, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/googling-job-interviewers-redux/246505/6 "2004-05-23T03:51:51Z")
> [@iamme99](#): > > You might not want to run for president given how the above minimal inforamtion could be easily twisted out of context… 😃😃 I can’t be President? Damn. Wait a tick, I’m Canadian! I’ve only seen parts of _Deliverance_, though, including that bit with the arrow stuck halfway through the guy’s body, which struck me as sufficiently implausible that I had to ask for SDMB opinions. And the best movie of the last several years was _Shakespeare in Love_ (which has a fight or two, I’ll admit). As for black cotton ninja underpants, I own 37 pairs.