Cybervetting job applicants on social media: the new normal?

Abstract

With the introduction of new information communication technologies, employers are increasingly engaging in social media screening, also known as cybervetting, as part of their hiring process. Our research, using an online survey with 482 participants, investigates young people's concerns with their publicly available social media data being used in the context of job hiring. Grounded in stakeholder theory, we analyze the relationship between young people's concerns with social media screening and their gender, job seeking status, privacy concerns, and social media use. We find that young people are generally not comfortable with social media screening. A key finding of this research is that concern for privacy for public information on social media cannot be fully explained by some "traditional" variables in privacy research. The research extends stakeholder theory to identify how social media data ethics should be inextricably linked to organizational practices. The findings have theoretical implications for a rich conceptualization of stakeholders in an age of social media and practical implications for organizations engaging in cybervetting.

Adolescents’ Sexy Self-Presentation on Instagram: An Investigation of Their Posting Behavior Using a Prototype Willingness Model Perspective

“…As older adolescents are more inclined to post sexy pictures of themselves online and as they will enter higher education and/or the job market, they could be educated about the potential impact of their pictures when they start higher education or apply for a job or internship [53]. Increasingly, human resources managers are engaging in cybervetting-the screening of social media in search for information about job applicants in order to evaluate their suitability for a specific position [64,65]. It is therefore important that young people are informed about the impression they could leave on potential employers when they perform online searches concerning potential job or internship applicants.…”

Cybervetting and the Public Life of Social Media Data

“…Another trend of critical importance that has received little attention in academic research is how third parties (mis)use the public’s social media data—especially when such data are publicly available and do not require users’ consent to be mined. This practice is problematic because even if social media posts are public, people may still have context-specific expectations of privacy (Dubois et al, 2020; Jacobson et al, 2020; Jacobson & Gruzd, 2020; Nissenbaum, 2018; Quinn & Papacharissi, 2018), which gives rise to “fuzzy boundaries” of privacy management (Child & Starcher, 2016).…”

Challenges and Opportunities for Small and Medium Enterprises in Eastern Indonesia in Facing the COVID-19 Pandemic and the New Normal Era

“…Therefore, the business owners need to make a training plan for their personnel that will support the development of their competitive advantage strategy (Peshkova, Kiselev, & Zimina, 2020). In addition, if the company wants to recruit, the new normality of the recruitment system through social media is the right solution, even though Jacobson & Gruzd (2020) states that most applicants who use social media do not feel comfortable due to the revealed personal information on social media and can be seen by the public. However, current information technology advances view that personal information is very difficult to be protected, especially in new normalities we must begin to learn to accept it, however, the company must still be committed to protect the personal data of their personnel and consumer from crime.…”