The Real Reasons Job Interviewers Want Your Facebook Password

There’s been a lot of recent controversy recently about interviewers requesting Facebook passwords from potential employees. Something about Congress vetoing things and privacy issues and not getting jobs and stuff. It’s all a lie. Here are the real reasons potential employers want access to your private life. 1. They Want to Change Your Profile Picture So there’s that awful picture of you in the 3rd block of DM that you marked “remove from profile,” because you and those tagged look like The International Mouthbreathing Competition and a psychopathic Indian serial killer.

That’s gonna be your profile picture when they get their wet, salty hands on your password.

They’re not gonna bother with your status. If your potential employer wanted to, they’d just ask you to leave your laptop open for a moment while you got them coffee, kissed their ass, provided them with sexual favors, or all of the above at once to test your multitasking abilities. And they don’t give a shit if your birthday’s tomorrow, next month, or Leap Day.

No, they need the extra time to scroll left through the kissyfaced disposable camera photo shoots back when you and your friends thought you were cool because you had just gotten a Facebook, gratuitous senior prom pictures, and all of the PWild photos of greasy people wearing fleece and beanies standing on mountains no one gives a flying fuck about. Then they’re gonna find and publicize the era when you’d changed your braces' brackets to your school colors for eighth grade graduation.

2. They're Changing Your Information Again, changing statuses is too easy. Employers want to showcase their creativity by changing your hometown to “Penisi” and your relationship status to “it’s complicated” with the Facebook made for your friend’s stuffed animal penguin (who you keep in close contact with). They’ll probably “like” the company page, to boost their numbers. They might subscribe to updates from Nickelback, or add their band to your pages.  If they’re feeling zany, they could change the language to the one you were “fluent in” on your job application, and watch your casually frantic struggle to change it back. Or they could just keep it in Pirate.

3. They want you to accept their friend request and “like” all their updates, because nobody else does Guys, we should pity them. Poor lonely employer hackers.

4. You're friends with Sir Twattingworth, and they want access to his family photos. And by family photos, they mean his mom.

I mean, I was really excited that one day the CIA would wiretap me only to find that my conversations consist of phone calls home to discuss the dog’s new haircut.* But potential employers intercepting my latest private message to my boyfriend, which consists of “this might be us” accompanied by a meme about overuse of the snooze button?

America, this might have gone too far.

—————————————————————————————————————————— *I call home on bad days so I can pretend that this happens.