Presentation from the HCII2014 conference (Heraklion, Crete, Greece, June 25-27, 2014), co-authored with Birgy Lorenz.

1. "If I Do Not Like Your Online Profile,
I Will Not Hire You!"
Birgy Lorenz Kaido Kikkas (presenter)
Digital Safety Lab, Digital Safety Lab,
Tallinn University Tallinn University +
Estonian IT College
HCII 2014, June 2014
Heraklion, Crete, Greece
Kaido Kikkas 2014. This presentation can be accessed and downloaded from
http://www.slideshare.net/UncleOwl in accordance with the Creative Commons
Attribution-ShareAlike (BY-SA) Estonia license (v.3.0 or newer)

2. Privacy...
● … was once just a philosophical category
● … then it became a legal matter (e.g. ancient
Jewish laws about the location of windows)
● … then it went technical (e.g. how to protect
sensitive information from interception)
● … nowadays it is increasingly behavioural
(out there, we see a lot of smartphones
around – unfortunately, many of them tend to
be operated by dumbusers :-( )

3. The F Generation
● X, Y, Z… Now there is the Facebook gen
● Digital natives
● If you are not online, you do not exist
● Some of them have reached adulthood by
now, becoming employers...
● … a lot more are employees…
● but even more are yet to become

4. Our study
● Main point – to find out what (if any) is the
difference of online behaviour expectation
between (future) employees and current
employers
● Mostly carried out by Birgy Lorenz in 2013 at
five Estonian schools, two higher education
facilities (TLU and EITC; altogether ~200)
and among a group of employers (~35)
● Produced a mixed bag of results, some of
which are rather thought-provoking

5. Main questions
● Whether Estonian companies perform an
online background check on prospective
employees and how it affects the choice
● How do young people (school and university
students) feel about that
● How do they manage their online presence
● What is done if too much has become public
● Note: this presentation focuses on general
outcomes - exact figures are in the article

6. Does it make sense to be online… ?
● A rising trend: 'ordinary people' need
protection not only from government and
companies, but more and more from their
peers as well
● 'The rules of the game' are increasingly
difficult => they are misunderstood and/or
ignored
● In a small society (in Estonia, 6 degrees
become 2), anonymity can be slippery

7. A well-done online profile...
● … can boost the person's 'social capital'
online, promoting interaction and new
contacts
● … can also invite unwanted attention:
– "hey, this dude is pretty rich"
– "the guy boasts in Facebook about being in
Crete for a week. So his apartment is empty,
let's pay him a visit"
– et cetera (identity theft, blackmailing etc)

8. Some findings
● Students/pupils:
– Most of them believe they will be screened by
employers; most have screened themselves
– Most of them are content with their online
image, even if a minority has tried to remove
some information
– Most of them reason that when only 20% of
online information about themselves are
submitted by themselves, it cannot be trusted
at all (NB! The employers clearly disagree)

9. ...
● …
– Most of them consider their work to be
separate from private life – what happens in
the evening is not the employers' business
– Most of them accept 'friend requests' rather
liberally
– Most of them believe that their work abilities
cannot be evaluated on their private life
(whether on- or offline)

10. …
● Employers:
– 2/3 of them will seek information online about
potential employees
– 2/3 assume the information to be true
– 1/3 consider it very suspicious when nothing
can be found about the person
– Most of them drop the candidate if some
serious misbehaviour is found (excessive
drinking, drug experience, violence etc)

11. ...
● Most of them consider it a good sign if not
too much information can be found
(interpreted to indicate a responsive person)
● At the same time, only 1/4 discuss their
online findings with the candidate during the
interview
● Most of them are only superficially aware of
ethical/legal considerations about online
screening

12. Main ways of coping
● Pupils
– I upload nothing, others do about me (thus
everything that is there is unreliable)
– I upload lots of good stuff about me, so
occasional bad things will be lost among that
– I upload total crap, nobody cares
● Students
– Search and destroy (significant among IT
guys) – conscious selection of information
– I know about threats, but honestly don't care

13. Red or blue pill...?
● Most of the youth were content with their
online reflection. Yet, during the case study,
in more than 50% of cases, people were able
to reveal
– Home address and/or phone
– Locations and pictures of various places
connected to the person
– Usernames at different online services
– Contact networks
– Location deduced from pastime activities

14. Contradictions
● Young people tend to downplay the impact of
online information (as if a kind of game),
while employers take it for true
● Young people think that if something was not
uploaded by them, it does not count.
Employers disagree ("Google cannot be
wrong, can it?")
● Young people assume that their private life is
separate from work. Employers disagree

15. Conclusions
● Responsible media usage must be stressed
further at school (actually, even some kinder-
gartens have introduced it in Estonia). Online
privacy of others should be more important
● Employers must be addressed too – to
increase awareness about various ethical
and legal issues concerning online screening

16. Thanks for your attention!
Contact:
birgy.lorenz@tlu.ee
kaido.kikkas@kakupesa.net
http://www.tlu.ee/dsl
The Digital Safety Lab is supported by the Tiger University Program
of the Estonian Information Technology Foundation for Education
http://somethinggeeky.com/program
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