Lawmakers push bill to ban bosses from asking for Facebook passwords

From The Hill:

Two Democrats introduced a bill on Friday that would ban employers from asking for their workers' Facebook passwords. 

The Social Networking Online Protection Act, introduced by Democratic Reps. Eliot Engel (N.Y.) and Jan Schakowsky (Ill.), would prohibit current or potential employers from demanding a username or password to a social networking account. 

The restriction would also apply to colleges, universities and schools. 

[snip]  

"We must draw the line somewhere and define what is private," Engel said in a statement. "No one would feel comfortable going to a public place and giving out their username and passwords to total strangers. They should not be required to do so at work, at school, or while trying to obtain work or an education. This is a matter of personal privacy and makes sense in our digital world.”  

This, I think, is a good thing. I've heard rumors of certain employers demanding Facebook account access information from potential candidates, and the whole thing struck me as particularly Orwellian, if on a small scale. (I hadn't necessarily heard about public schools doing this, but one can see the writing on the wall.)

Granted, if an employer asked me for the right to rummage through my social media or email accounts, the interview would be over - that's not the kind of employer I'd want to work for. Still, though, its nice to see Congress doing something in the people's interest for a change. Better to nip something this egregious in the butt before it becomes a widespread practice.