Gazette.com reports that those resumes that people post on job websites are not always generating job leads. All too often these resumes result in unwanted sales pitches.
After he posted his resume online in 2004, Ed Pilarski got more responses than he bargained for.
More than a dozen companies called or e-mailed the retired Verizon Communications Inc. project manager with job offers he did not want or mortgage refinancing deals he did not need.
One caller stood out: A Morgan Stanley financial adviser who allegedly viewed the resume of Pilarski and hundreds of others posted on job-hunting Web site CareerBuilder.com.
The adviser suggested Pilarski "must have done pretty well financially" at Verizon. Outraged that information in his resume was being used for sales leads, Pilarski complained about Morgan Stanley’s "backroom tactics" to Massachusetts Secretary of State William F. Galvin, who recently charged the firm and several employees with violations of privacy rules.
Some job recruiters say Pilarski's case is all too common. The misuse of resume data has become a big issue for the fastgrowing sites that are now a main source of talent for some industries, as well as a growing risk to individuals as hackers target the vast databases of personal information.
This isn't why people put their resumes online. People using resume sites seem to be under the gun lately. Recently, Monster.com was hacked and data from over 1.6 million users was stolen. The USAJOBS website has also been hit by the same malware (Infostealer.Monstres) that stole date from the Monster.com website. You can read a security notice from usajobs.gov here. Resume databases are very valuable and they need to be protected from both phishers and spammers.
