As online searches of applicants’ social media postings on Facebook and Twitter continue to rise in the employment area, landlords are joining suit and putting themselves at legal risk. Landlords who acquire information from these sources, whether using it to make a decision or not, may run into trouble if challenged by an applicant to prove that knowledge of the applicant’s religion, ethnicity, age and other extraneous information was irrelevant. Tenants are also taking the risk of rejection by exposing personal information online and may have difficulty proving whether or not a future landlord or employer factored social media postings into their decisions.
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