We have known for a long time that hiring managers use the Internet to look up information on their job applicants. Microsoft has done another survey called Online Reputation in a Connected World with over 1100 hiring managers and HR professionals in Germany, France, the UK, and the US.

“Now,” it states, “recruiters can easily and anonymously collect information that they would not be permitted to ask in an interview, and the survey found that recruiters are doing just that.”

Among the more surprising survey findings: 75 percent of U.S. recruiters say their companies have formal policies in place that require hiring personnel to research applicants online. That figure drops to 48 percent for U.K.-based hiring managers and 21 percent for both the German and French counterparts.

It should be interesting to see whether any legislature moves to make a law forbidding this. It would be very hard to police/report, so I doubt it. Still, it is something job applicants should be aware of. Their Internet reputation can tell employers all sorts of information that they didn’t want known.

http://www.hreonline.com/HRE/story.jsp?storyId=374699407