by Nick Fishman

I guess none of us should be surprised by the results of a recent study conducted by US Information Security Company Cyber-Ark which suggests that one out of every three IT professionals admitted to snooping.  47% admitted to accessing company information that wasn’t relevant to them.

Here are some other hair-raising findings from the study:

Cyber-Ark said privileged passwords get changed far less frequently than user passwords, with 30 percent being changed every quarter and 9 percent never changed at all, meaning that IT staff who have left an organization could still gain access.

It added that seven out of 10 companies rely on outdated and insecure methods to exchange sensitive data, with 35 percent choosing email and 35 percent using couriers, while 4 percent still relied on the postal system.

employeescreenIQ has long recognized that IT professionals have nearly unfettered access to an organizations infrastructure and that those that wish to abuse such access could do significant harm.

Here’s my best background screening tip for IT people:  SCREEN THEM!

Okay, I’ve got some better recommendations for background screening services to be considered:  Social Security Number Trace, County Criminal Record Search in each County the Applicant has lived, worked or attended school and in each name revealed in the SSN Trace, National Criminal Database Search (only in conjunction with a county search), Federal District Criminal Record Search, Employment Verifications, Education Verifications, Credit Check and a Substance Abuse Test.

Seem like a pretty extensive search?  It is, but if performing these searches help you protect yourself, your employees and your business, it’s well worth it.

by Nick Fishman

We just published a new White Paper about Violence in the Workplace written by employeescreenIQ president and C.O.O., Jason B. Morris.  This free content provides some research and statistics on workplace violence, recent public incidents and some advice for prevention.

This free information can be downloaded by clicking the link below (hope the basic information we request is a minor inconvenience in exchange for the insightful content):

Violence in the Workplace

by Nick Fishman

A new study on Substance Abuse conducted in Perth, Australia shows that 1 in 3 meth users admit to getting high on the job. 4% of the Australian workers surveyed admitted to recent use of ice, speed or other forms of methamphetamine. This results of this survey shouldn’t really shock anyone. You might recall a U.S. study released in July, 2007 showed that 1 in 12 U.S. workers had used drugs within a month of the time of the study. These two studies scream out to employers the need to conduct Substance Abuse Screening on all new hires.

by Nick Fishman

This is about a month old now, but an old friend from SHRM passed this study on Employment Screening in the retail sector which was published in Loss Preventation Magazine. See some key findings below:

The purpose of the survey was to benchmark large retailers’ current pre-employment screening programs. The survey was sent to the most senior-level loss prevention executive in ten leading U.S. retailers. The surveyed retailers ranged in store count from 250 to over 3,000 locations and included both hardline and softline retailers. The survey focused on five types of screening processes—drug testing, assessments, credit checks, criminal history, and motor vehicle checks. The scope of the survey included store, distribution centers, and corporate levels at each retail company. The survey was conducted in March, 2007.
The survey did not attempt to evaluate the ROI from a pre-employment background screening program. While this is outside the scope of this survey, many retail companies have an internal ROI process measuring programs such a pre-employment screening.
The chart below is a summary of the responses to the five primary questions. Conducting an assessment is clearly the most common pre-employment screening method employed, followed by conducting a criminal background check.

Screening Type: Store Distribution Center Corporate
Drug Screen 50% 60% 40%
Assessment 90% 40% 40%
Credit Check 0% 0% 33%
Criminal Background Check 70% 80% 70%
Motor Vehicle Record Check 0% 60% 40%

I am a little surprised that assessments beat out criminal background checks at the store level, but given the cost structure of screening tactics perhaps it makes sense. Also, I’m surprised that the Substance Abuse Screening levels and use of Criminal Background Checks vary from Store, to Distribution Center, to Corporate. I would think that if these things were important at one level, they would be important at all.

by Nick Fishman

We’ve just released the latest edition of our Quarterly Newsletter, The Verifier. Please feel free to check it out.

http://theverifier.net/index.php

by Kevin Bachman

by Kevin Bachman

by Nick Fishman

Well, it certainly took them long enough to catch up to the rest of the country, but we are finally seeing some positive trends when it come to higher education institutions and background checks. I found this great article, Checking Up on Your Past on insidehighered.com (I’m sure today’s college students get a kick out of the name of this on-line publication).

The article focuses on last week’s annual meeting of the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources (who knew there was such a thing? but I bet you background screeners will be flocking to it from now on). Evidently, the topic of background checks was all the rage. Noteworthy in this article is a study conducted by Stephanie Hughes, an assistant professor of management at Northern Kentucky University on the use of background checks among universities. See a snapshot of results below.

- 13% of university’s polled never engage in criminal background checks
- 87% perform checks for some staff positions
- 40% screen for some faculty positions
- 26% conduct checks on some student workers

These are good stats, but a little misleading since “The way the survey was phrased, a “Yes” answer meant only that in some cases, a person in that category would be subject to a background check. That means that a college that would investigate a potential professor being hired in a field where security clearances are necessary or for work with young children would have answered Yes even if the vast majority of professorial hires are never subjected to a criminal background check.”

Good article and even better trend nonetheless.

by Nick Fishman

Okay. I owe the readers of this blog an apology for playing it safe and sitting on the sidelines on this one. Credit card titan Visa issued a press release on September 13th titled “Americans Unaware That Employers Can Legally Refuse to Hire Job Applicants With Low Credit Scores“ The release points out that many employers are making their hiring decisions based on a credit score. I strongly disagree with this statement. Our experience is that employers stay as far away from credit scores as they can. I wasn’t even sure if it was legal or permissible to use a credit score in the hiring decision so I took a week to discuss this topic with the folks at Experian and with some employment attorneys before snapping off an uneducated response. I have learned that while it is permissible, it is most likely ill-advised. The most common explanation for their opinions is the potential for a disparate impact on minorities. Not to mention that a bad credit score can occur for so many reasons unrelated to personal responsibility including divorce, critical healthcare issues, etc.

I did test the waters by responding to an ERE post that published the release going as far as calling out the folks at Visa for not doing their homework. I stand by this assertion. They should have clarified that employers are increasingly reviewing a credit report on prospective employees, not necessarily credit scores. That said, I think that the release is interesting. I just think Visa should have spent a bit more time fine tuning the information.

by Nick Fishman

Okay. So maybe this isn’t new news, but the story never gets old. Two Stamford, CT based HR Consulting firms released a study that shows that 65% of the companies in Fairfield county and the metro New York area conduct background checks. The findings were published in the Greenwich Time. See link to article below.

http://www.greenwichtime.com/news/local/scn-sa-b2b1aug23,0,2640911.story?coll=green-news-local-headlines

While the study doesn’t point this out, I think this news is noteworthy because those that conduct background checks in New York are subject to exhorbitant court access fees. For those of you unfamilar, New York established the Office of Court Administration (OCA) to act as a clearinghouse for criminal records in the the state of New York. The price tag for the privledge of this information: $52.00! (More on the OCA in a post later this week.)

Anyway, it is encouraging to see that these outrageous fees are not making it cost-prohibitive for employers to perform proper due diligence on their job applicants.