The next time you apply for a job your ‘could-be employer’ may require a social media background check. That’s right. Employers looking at candidates’ presence online is an actual “thing” now. If you’re waiting for a, “It’s like a criminal background check but not,” line…well. Keep waiting because it’s exactly like a criminal background check. A company called Social Intelligence actually specializing in professional eligibility research recently made its service available to businesses everywhere.  

Here’s how it works: Company A wants to hire Candidate B but also want to make sure he/she won’t cause the company any trouble down the road. Company A hires Social Intelligence to stalk Candidate B from information obtained from his/her resume (name, email, school, hometown, etc). They look up Candidate B’s activity on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, MySpace, dating sites, forums, blog sites, Wikipedia (Get the point?) over the last seven years and compile a document that then tells Company A that Candidate B has or has not engaged in illegal, racist, mean, or sexually explicit behaviors…publicly at least. Candidate B either passes or fails. It’s like Googling someone, but excessively more effective.

While I certainly have some concerns about the subjectivity of what’s “too inappropriate” (all checks are done by humans by the way, not computers), I think we all knew this day was coming. ‘Social Media Background Checks’ are the new ‘Character References’ and, as a person who desperately wants to know if he would pass or fail his own official background check, I understand how much insight this service could offer an employer.

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