So I had to open my big mouth on my previous post today and say that Facebook is keeping its nose clean with regard to news as of late. I guess it still is despite this particular incident that happened to a woman living in our neighbor to the north, Canada.
You remember Canada. The place where Facebook had to adhere to their privacy policies for threat of shutting them down? Well, I wonder how that privacy deal is working out because it looks like companies working on Canadian soil may need a lesson in privacy. The CBC reports
A Quebec woman on long-term sick leave is fighting to have her benefits reinstated after her employer’s insurance company cut them, she says, because of photos posted on Facebook.
Nathalie Blanchard, 29, has been on leave from her job at IBM in Bromont, Que., for the last year and a half after she was diagnosed with major depression.
The Eastern Townships woman was receiving monthly sick-leave benefits from Manulife, her insurance company, but the payments dried up this fall.
When Blanchard called Manulife, the company said that “I’m available to work, because of Facebook,” she told CBC News this week.
Now before you get your knickers in a twist, I am not defending this woman. Honestly, I don’t really care if she is trying to get over on a company or not. I have too many other things to worry about.
What does make me wonder is how the insurance company accessed her Facebook account if they were not allowed by Ms. Blanchard? My guess would be that someone at IBM who is her ‘friend’ on Facebook turned over some data but I am not a private investigator and any speculation as to how this happens stops here.
What doesn’t stop here is where are lines going to be drawn moving forward. Of course, if you are ignorant (or even stupid) enough to put damning evidence on Facebook then that’s nothing that anyone can control. What will be considered actual evidence as retrieved through social media?
The story says
She said her insurance agent described several pictures Blanchard posted on the popular social networking site, including ones showing her having a good time at a Chippendales bar show, at her birthday party and on a sun holiday — evidence that she is no longer depressed, Manulife said.
Huh? What if she was just trying to get undepressed (is that even a word?) and and part of the process was to share her ‘happiness’ with others? Where will a line be drawn on this kind of stuff? In the US it’ll like land in the 9th Circuit because if it’s weird that’s where it goes.
Anyway, what’s your take on this one? Should the insurance company be ale to use Facebook as evidence if they were not directly connected to her account? Is finding out information in Facebook any different though than investigators digging to find evidence any way they can? Or will these kind of stories just always be part of the social media world we live in and we just need to make sure to keep our side of the street clean?
Fire off before you head out for the weekend. We’d like to hear from you.
Here is the original post:
Woman Loses Benefits, In Part, Due to Facebook
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