Glassdoor will add your info to older accounts if they can
March 18, 2024 7:13 AM Subscribe
As seen on perennial MetaFilter favourite Ask A Manager, one user shares their experience having an old Glassdoor account linked to their name due to an email.
That user also shares how hard it was to get the information deleted.
This is a single bloggy link but seems relevant to this audience as well as another step in the gradual elimination of truly anonymous accounts.
That user also shares how hard it was to get the information deleted.
This is a single bloggy link but seems relevant to this audience as well as another step in the gradual elimination of truly anonymous accounts.
On my way out of a shitty job once, I suggested that six or eight weeks of severance would be enough for me to sign an agreement prohibiting me from writing a Glassdoor review. They thought about it and offered me eight.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:39 AM on March 18 [72 favorites]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:39 AM on March 18 [72 favorites]
Literally clicked over to post this right now
posted by bq at 7:47 AM on March 18 [2 favorites]
posted by bq at 7:47 AM on March 18 [2 favorites]
How is Glassdoor even going to work without anonymity?
Has Glassdoor been sued by a company claiming to be harmed by negative reviews and alleging that the reviews were untrue because they were anonymous?
posted by slkinsey at 7:55 AM on March 18 [2 favorites]
Has Glassdoor been sued by a company claiming to be harmed by negative reviews and alleging that the reviews were untrue because they were anonymous?
posted by slkinsey at 7:55 AM on March 18 [2 favorites]
Is any of this retroactively changing agreements and doxing people even legal?
posted by Faintdreams at 7:56 AM on March 18 [2 favorites]
posted by Faintdreams at 7:56 AM on March 18 [2 favorites]
Make sure to catch that the claim here is not that names are being added to anonymous reviews, but rather that a name has been added to the account:
I got a reply from "lead, content and community team" -- I'm eliding employee names in this public post because I have more scruples than they do -- who informed me that though they were "required" to add my name to my profile, this would not affect the anonymous reviews I had posted in the past.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 8:03 AM on March 18 [5 favorites]
I got a reply from "lead, content and community team" -- I'm eliding employee names in this public post because I have more scruples than they do -- who informed me that though they were "required" to add my name to my profile, this would not affect the anonymous reviews I had posted in the past.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 8:03 AM on March 18 [5 favorites]
I have left only the one Glassdoor review, and it was about a place being mega shitty, and I guess I need to track that down and see if it has my name on it.
I would stand by it, probably, but I’d want to know it’s out there.
posted by Artw at 8:37 AM on March 18
I would stand by it, probably, but I’d want to know it’s out there.
posted by Artw at 8:37 AM on March 18
Just went to relive the schendfraude of my (highly thumbed-up) negative review of an abusive employer and got this pop-up:
posted by audi alteram partem at 8:43 AM on March 18 [7 favorites]
Looks like you haven’t shared anything on Glassdoor in the past 12 months!Jokes on them! I've been out of work (laid off from said crappy employer) for so long I have neither review nor salary to add.
To enjoy another 12 months of access please contribute anonymously to help the community.
Add review or salary
posted by audi alteram partem at 8:43 AM on March 18 [7 favorites]
Okay, too many hoops to actually check on that, I’m going to assume my anonymity is safe.
posted by Artw at 9:41 AM on March 18
posted by Artw at 9:41 AM on March 18
I was recently poking around on my account at Facebook, and discovered that it had somehow added two former names of mine: the name my parents gave me, which I have not used in over 40 years, and which I changed legally well before the Internet era. And my name from a former marriage, which I have also tried to leave behind me. I was able to delete them, but I wasn’t thrilled to see them there. Fortunately, their presence doesn’t put me in any danger. It just reveals things I might not want to reveal to everybody.
posted by Well I never at 11:17 AM on March 18 [8 favorites]
posted by Well I never at 11:17 AM on March 18 [8 favorites]
It’s like a supervillain’s plan to discover everyone’s secret identities, only much dumber, more invasive, and dangerous. Where’s Batman’s fist when you actually need it?
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:28 AM on March 18
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:28 AM on March 18
> Make sure to catch that the claim here is not that names are being added to anonymous reviews, but rather that a name has been added to the account:
>> I got a reply from "lead, content and community team" -- I'm eliding employee names in this public post because I have more scruples than they do -- who informed me that though they were "required" to add my name to my profile, this would not affect the anonymous reviews I had posted in the past.
Sure, and never in the history of the internet has a user database ever been leaked because of poor security or a bug in a website.
This was a website that was never given the persons name, was explicitly nameless to allow anonymous contributions, adding a name to a user account and even refusing to delete it because they discovered the person's name through a different method, all of this against their own terms and conditions.
They don't have consent to store that person's real name. They promise to delete data if you withdraw consent. They ignored both promises, and said "too bad, because we want your name, we'll keep it associated with your activity here".
And sure, they don't display it right now. If and when that happens it will be an "accident" -- but it will be an "accident" caused by their deliberate decision to lie about what they will do with user data, based off internal policies they believe will earn them money as they want to set up a social network that requires real names.
"Oops, sorry about that, we shouldn't have added your name to your account without your explicit permission" is the right response, followed by "we'll never do that again, we fixed the procedure that lets that happen".
posted by NotAYakk at 1:16 PM on March 18 [18 favorites]
>> I got a reply from "lead, content and community team" -- I'm eliding employee names in this public post because I have more scruples than they do -- who informed me that though they were "required" to add my name to my profile, this would not affect the anonymous reviews I had posted in the past.
Sure, and never in the history of the internet has a user database ever been leaked because of poor security or a bug in a website.
This was a website that was never given the persons name, was explicitly nameless to allow anonymous contributions, adding a name to a user account and even refusing to delete it because they discovered the person's name through a different method, all of this against their own terms and conditions.
They don't have consent to store that person's real name. They promise to delete data if you withdraw consent. They ignored both promises, and said "too bad, because we want your name, we'll keep it associated with your activity here".
And sure, they don't display it right now. If and when that happens it will be an "accident" -- but it will be an "accident" caused by their deliberate decision to lie about what they will do with user data, based off internal policies they believe will earn them money as they want to set up a social network that requires real names.
"Oops, sorry about that, we shouldn't have added your name to your account without your explicit permission" is the right response, followed by "we'll never do that again, we fixed the procedure that lets that happen".
posted by NotAYakk at 1:16 PM on March 18 [18 favorites]
an interesting post in the comments setion:
Re #5: I’m not an attorney, but a 2022 legal ruling against Glassdoor raised this possibility in my mind—it held that Glassdoor had to reveal the poster names for some reviews the employer said were false and defamatory. It didn’t say that GD had to reveal the names publicly, but it occurred to me that they would probably begin to collect it as their own safeguard in the event of similar legal actions. I believe the plaintiff was Zuru but I’m not certain
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 1:56 PM on March 18 [4 favorites]
Re #5: I’m not an attorney, but a 2022 legal ruling against Glassdoor raised this possibility in my mind—it held that Glassdoor had to reveal the poster names for some reviews the employer said were false and defamatory. It didn’t say that GD had to reveal the names publicly, but it occurred to me that they would probably begin to collect it as their own safeguard in the event of similar legal actions. I believe the plaintiff was Zuru but I’m not certain
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 1:56 PM on March 18 [4 favorites]
Maybe I'm not looking at it from the right angle, but wouldn't that be a good reason for Glassdoor to avoid collecting real names? So they can't be forced to reveal them?
posted by nobody at 2:05 PM on March 18 [12 favorites]
posted by nobody at 2:05 PM on March 18 [12 favorites]
I feel like California's Consumer Privacy Act would apply here. Of course someone in California would have to test it out.
posted by soelo at 5:38 PM on March 18 [2 favorites]
posted by soelo at 5:38 PM on March 18 [2 favorites]
as a matter of record, and in the 100% irony department:
If you made a CCPA request inquiry it was logged with your name, phone, email address and (possibly) physical address. If you requested it be destroyed, that too was logged with your name, phone email address and definitely your physical address. The reason? Because in 6 months when you go back to sue them, that they can say you reached out on Day/Time X, verified that it was you, and had your account removed.
Before we get the pitch forks, what this also did was prevent retaliatory ex spouses who knew all necessary information, from outright delisting someone out of harassment, or at least being able to create a paper trail that they did so. The down-side of course was that it was still impossible to recreate the information lost in the CCPA purge, but at least you could prove the harassment.
posted by Nanukthedog at 6:11 PM on March 18 [2 favorites]
If you made a CCPA request inquiry it was logged with your name, phone, email address and (possibly) physical address. If you requested it be destroyed, that too was logged with your name, phone email address and definitely your physical address. The reason? Because in 6 months when you go back to sue them, that they can say you reached out on Day/Time X, verified that it was you, and had your account removed.
Before we get the pitch forks, what this also did was prevent retaliatory ex spouses who knew all necessary information, from outright delisting someone out of harassment, or at least being able to create a paper trail that they did so. The down-side of course was that it was still impossible to recreate the information lost in the CCPA purge, but at least you could prove the harassment.
posted by Nanukthedog at 6:11 PM on March 18 [2 favorites]
The real name thing that both Facebook and Glassdoor do is entirely because you are worth more to advertisers if they can attach a name to person. So they force you to do that in the name of security when in reality it’s entirely in the name of their revenue.
posted by jmauro at 5:14 AM on March 19 [1 favorite]
posted by jmauro at 5:14 AM on March 19 [1 favorite]
Ars Technnica is now reporting on this.
Originally saw the dreamwidth link on mastodon a few days before it surfaced here. It's been a slowish roll, but looks like it's gathering momentum.
posted by ursus_comiter at 4:17 PM on March 19 [3 favorites]
Originally saw the dreamwidth link on mastodon a few days before it surfaced here. It's been a slowish roll, but looks like it's gathering momentum.
posted by ursus_comiter at 4:17 PM on March 19 [3 favorites]
Enshittification example number...
Maybe, on the "snitch" site, a "social network" isn't a fucking thing you want, but you pivot you badboy, pivot the fuck away and lose your strength on what you were, god I hate everything.
It's harder and harder to not feel that a certain 'FC' may have had some points (amidst 1000 wrong ones, including methods).
posted by symbioid at 7:58 PM on March 19 [1 favorite]
Maybe, on the "snitch" site, a "social network" isn't a fucking thing you want, but you pivot you badboy, pivot the fuck away and lose your strength on what you were, god I hate everything.
It's harder and harder to not feel that a certain 'FC' may have had some points (amidst 1000 wrong ones, including methods).
posted by symbioid at 7:58 PM on March 19 [1 favorite]
https://help.glassdoor.com/s/privacyrequest?language=en_US
...because you really cannot assume your old account is still anonymous.
posted by aramaic at 7:30 AM on March 20
...because you really cannot assume your old account is still anonymous.
posted by aramaic at 7:30 AM on March 20
I just remembered:
My current Glassdoor account (that I can't access without giving a workplace review or salary information) isn't my original account.
I had to request that first account be deleted because in 2016, Glassdoor sent out an email about updated Terms of Service where they exposed hundreds of email addresses in CC field of the email.
So this isn't the first time they preemptively exposed people's information.
posted by audi alteram partem at 7:39 AM on March 20 [1 favorite]
My current Glassdoor account (that I can't access without giving a workplace review or salary information) isn't my original account.
I had to request that first account be deleted because in 2016, Glassdoor sent out an email about updated Terms of Service where they exposed hundreds of email addresses in CC field of the email.
So this isn't the first time they preemptively exposed people's information.
posted by audi alteram partem at 7:39 AM on March 20 [1 favorite]
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posted by warriorqueen at 7:17 AM on March 18 [27 favorites]