When Justin Bassett interviewed for a new job, he expected the usual questions about experience and references. So he was astonished when the interviewer asked for something else: his Facebook username and password.

Bassett, a New York City statistician, had just finished answering a few character questions when the interviewer turned to her computer to search for his Facebook page. But she couldn’t see his private profile. She turned back and asked him to hand over his login information.

Bassett refused and withdrew his application, saying he didn’t want to work for a company that would seek such personal information. But as the job market steadily improves, other job candidates are confronting the same question from prospective employers, and some of them cannot afford to say no.

In their efforts to vet applicants, some companies and government agencies are going beyond merely glancing at a person’s social networking profiles and instead asking to log in as the user to have a look around.

"It’s akin to requiring someone’s house keys," said Orin Kerr, a George Washington University law professor and former federal prosecutor who calls it "an egregious privacy violation."

Questions have been raised about the legality of the practice, which is also the focus of proposed legislation in Illinois and Maryland that would forbid public agencies from asking for access to social networks.

Since the rise of social networking, it has become common for managers to review publically available Facebook profiles, Twitter accounts and other sites to learn more about job candidates. But many users, especially on Facebook, have their profiles set to private, making them available only to selected people or certain networks.

Companies that don’t ask for passwords have taken other steps — such as asking applicants to friend human resource managers or to log in to a company computer during an interview. Once employed, some workers have been required to sign non-disparagement agreements that ban them from talking negatively about an employer on social media.

Asking for a candidate’s password is more prevalent among public agencies, especially those seeking to fill law enforcement positions such as police officers or 911 dispatchers.

 Vocabulary:

reference: 推荐信，介绍信

vet: 调查，检查

akin to: 近似，好似

egregious: 过分的，恶名昭彰的

当贾斯汀•巴西特参加求职面试时，他以为会被问到工作经验、推荐信等常规问题，因此当被问到Facebook用户名和密码时，他大吃一惊。

巴西特是纽约市的一名统计员，在回答了一些性格问题后，面试者转向她自己的电脑，搜索他的Facebook主页，但无法看到他的个人资料。她转过身，问他登录信息。

巴西特拒绝了她，并要回了自己的求职申请，说他不想在这样一个索要私人信息的公司工作。但随着就业市场持续改善，其他的应聘者也会被未来的雇主问到同样的问题，其中有些人无法拒绝。

一些公司和政府机构在审核应聘者时，不仅会浏览个人的社交网站资料，还要以使用者的身份登录账户一看究竟。

美国乔治华盛顿大学法律教授、前联邦检察官奥林•科尔称，“侵犯隐私的行为太过分了。”他说：“这无异于要别人家门钥匙。”

有人质疑这种行为的合法性，这也是伊利诺斯州和马里兰州的一项禁止公共机构索要社交网站隐私信息的提案的焦点。

自从社交网站风靡以来，主管查看公开的Facebook资料、推特账户和其他社交网站，以更多地了解应聘者，这种行为已经很常见。但是很多用户，特别是Facebook用户将资料设为私密，这使主管只能看到特定的人或者特定网站上的资料。

不要密码的公司采取了其他措施，比如要求应聘者将人力资源主管加为好友，或者在面试时在公司的电脑上登录社交网站。一旦录用，公司还会要求员工签署不损害名誉协定，禁止他们在社交网站上贬低雇主。

公共机构索要社交网站密码的情况更常见，特别是一些执法部门的职位，比如警察或者911调度员。