Consumer affairs minister Ilse Aigner “calls on citizens who use the internet often to think about what they put online,” a spokesperson for her ministry told a regular government news conference.<\/p>\n
The ministry sounded the alarm bell after a study it commissioned found that more than one in four firms routinely vet applicants by doing online searches, often before extending invitations to job interviews.<\/p>\n
Most use sites such as Facebook or its homegrown rival StudiVZ to access material not restricted by privacy settings.<\/p>\n
The study by the independent Dimap institute found that 28% of the around 500 German companies polled searched for information about their would-be employees’ hobbies, political opinions and personal lives.<\/p>\n
Three in four said they judged candidates negatively who complain about their jobs in public forums or post pictures of themselves at rowdy parties.<\/p>\n
It followed a US survey for Career Builder.com that showed nearly half of companies snoop on the online profiles of job candidates.<\/p>\n