Social Media: Invasion of Privacy

Personal Social-Media Accounts
Cities must comply with applicable federal, Tennessee, and local privacy, employment, and labor laws when using social media in hiring, investigations, discipline, or other employment decisions.

Under Tennessee’s Employee Online Privacy Act of 2014, T.C.A. §§ 50-1-1001 through 50-1-1004, a city may not:

• Request or require an applicant or employee to disclose a password that provides access to a personal internet account.
• Require an applicant or employee to add the city, an employment agency, a supervisor, or another representative to the individual’s personal-account contacts or connections.
• Require an applicant or employee to access a personal internet account in the city’s presence so that the city may view its contents.
• Refuse to hire, discipline, discharge, or otherwise penalize an applicant or employee for declining to provide access to a personal internet account.

A personal internet account generally includes a personal social-media account, personal email account, or another personal online account used to create, share, or view user-generated content.

The city should never attempt to obtain an applicant’s or employee’s personal-account password through another person, impersonation, deception, coercion, or another unauthorized method. The city should not use another individual’s login credentials to obtain access to content that is not publicly available.

Permitted City Access
Tennessee law does not prohibit a city from viewing information that is publicly available online. However, the city should use public social-media information only under a written, job-related policy and should not rely on inaccurate, incomplete, misidentified, or protected-status information in an employment decision.

The Employee Online Privacy Act also permits limited access to city-owned devices, city-provided accounts, and city business systems. For example, the city may request credentials necessary to access:

• An electronic communications device supplied by, or paid for in whole or in part by, the city.
• An account or service provided by the city because of the employment relationship.
• An account used for city business purposes.

The city may also conduct a lawful investigation or require employee cooperation when it has specific information involving potential violations of law, regulatory requirements, work-related misconduct, or unauthorized transfer of city proprietary, confidential, or financial information to a personal account. These exceptions are fact-specific and should be reviewed with Human Resources or legal counsel before access is sought.