Workforce Bulletin

With the ever-increasing amount of information available on social media, employers should remember to exercise caution when utilizing social media as a part of their Human Resources/ Recruitment related activities.  As we have discussed in a prior blog post, “Should Employers and Facebook Be Friends?” we live in a digital-age, and how people choose to define themselves is often readily showcased on social networking sites.  Whether – and how – employers choose to interact with the online presence of their workforce will continue to develop as the relevant legal standards ...

Virginia has now joined the chorus of jurisdictions that ban social media snooping by employers.  As we previously reported here and here, in a growing trend a number of states prohibit employers from requiring prospective or current employees to provide access to their social media accounts during the hiring process.  On March 7, 2015, the Virginia legislature passed H. 2081, a law prohibiting employers from asking or requiring employees or applicants (1) to disclose the username and password to their social media accounts, and (2) to add an employer to the list of contacts ...

By: Kara M. Maciel and Matthew Sorensen

Social media has become an increasingly important tool for businesses to market their products and services. As the use of social media in business continues to grow, companies will face new challenges with respect to the protection of their confidential information and business goodwill, as several recent federal district court decisions demonstrate.  

Christou v. Beatport, LLC (D. Colo. 2012), Ardis Health, LLC v. Nankivell (S.D. N.Y. 2011), and PhoneDog v. Kravitz (N.D. Cal. 2011) each involved former employees who took the login ...