1.2.8 Guidance: Use of Social Networking Sites (Facebook) by Social Care Staff in the Course of Their Work

This chapter was introduced in December 2011.

1. Introduction

This guidance is not intended to cover use by Social Care staff of social networking sites in their private and personal lives. It concerns the use of such sites for the purpose of work, and specifically in the process of gathering information about service users and their families, and known associates and/or suspected associates.

Where a member of staff maintains a social networking profile for their own personal use, this must not be used to communicate with service users, or to convey official information, nor must it be used for collecting or surveying information which may be used for official purposes. In circumstances where a member of staff does use their own profile to communicate with or gather information about a service user or their family/associates then not only will this information be inadmissible in any legal process but also that member of staff may also face disciplinary action.

Social networking sites are constructed by individuals who are able to specify through the use of privacy settings and by making decisions about who they will be “friends” with, who sees the information which is posted on their profile.

By posting information, including text and photographs, on a profile which is not protected by privacy settings, the person who makes the material available is, in effect, publishing it to an unrestricted audience. It is reasonable therefore that this material can be read and used in the course of an assessment, or the supervision of a case.

Where information is restricted to “friends” there is a clear intention to limit the use of the material and it cannot therefore be described as in the public domain.

Social work staff must not examine the social networking profile of service users using their own personal profile. In order to address this issue Wakefield Council will pilot a corporate private profile, with access limited to a small number of key staff which will be framed by an authorisation protocol.

2. Social Networking Forensic Use Pilot

Summary

The Pilot will formalise the process of examining social networking web sites and test an authorisation framework to enable social workers to look at social networking sites in controlled circumstances and use the information publicly available there in the course of assessments and supervision of service users and their families and associates about whom there are concerns.

Scope

The pilot will use access to Facebook only in the pilot period. This is the most popular of the social networking sites and limiting the scope to one provider will enable us to focus on the effectiveness of the process, rather than the merits of different information sources. Six Social Care staff will be trained and authorised to access Facebook using an officially sanctioned account.

The pilot will run in the first instance for six months.

Evaluation Criteria

Be successful the process must demonstrate to the satisfaction of the authorising person (Service Director) that:

It provides information which would not otherwise be available;
The information obtained is of value to the investigation or assessment;
The time spent obtaining the information is proportionate to its value.

To measure the above, the following data will be maintained by the Service Manager (Looked After Children’s Service) which will be obtained from a feedback template form that originating social workers will be expected to complete after the Social Network Site has been accessed:

How many times the system was used;
Time taken to search Facebook;
How many useful pieces of information were identified;
How many unique pieces of information were identified;
How much the information found contributed to the investigation. This will have a rating approach, for example ‘little’ to ‘significant’ to allow them to scale its value. A further check in respect of the usefulness of the information will be undertaken after six months to identify longer term usefulness.

Additionally the Service Director and Service Manager will seek user feedback on the ease and effectiveness of the authorisation system as part of the pilot process.

3. Protocol for authorising access to Facebook

Terminology

Originating Social Worker - Social worker who is undertaking an investigation or an assessment and has cause to believe that there may be relevant Facebook information.

Authorised Access Worker - Social Worker or Family Support Worker who is authorised as part of this pilot to access Facebook using WMDC log on.

Procedure

Originating Social Worker is alerted to the need to check some aspects of a service user’s and/or their family’s/associate’s account of current or recent events which might affect the safety of a child or children, i.e.

Reasonable ground to believe that information given by a family as part of the assessment is misleading or untrue e.g. the claimed separation of a couple where domestic abuse is known to be a significant risk factor;
Possible relationship between child and a known or suspected abusive adult;
Presence of known risky behaviour, drug taking, drinking etc;
Persons Posing a Risk to a child said to be present in family relationships.

Originating Social Worker examines concerns with his/her Team Manager in context of supervision and identifies potential ways in which concerns can be triangulated.

If Team Manager agrees that checking Facebook is an appropriate triangulation, the Team Manager requests permission from Service Director to make contact with Authorised Access Worker to request a check of Facebook.

The Originating Social Worker needs to be as specific as possible about the people and timescales to be interrogated. Normally the process will include a one off review of currently available information on a Facebook site If it is envisaged that longer term monitoring is required, this should be specifically stated.

The Originating Social Worker must complete the Investigation Request (Appendix 1) and include the name and as many details as possible of each adult whose Facebook site it is proposed to check. This may include known associates and/or suspected associates. If there are suspected associate(s) whose name(s) is/are not known, these should be referred to in as much detail as possible (e.g. an allegation that the mother of children is engaged in an online relationship with an unknown man believed to be behaving inappropriately).

Authorised Access Worker has authority and responsibility to satisfy themselves that log-on is legitimate. If they have any doubts regarding the validity of this search they should refer back to the Service Manager and Service Director for further discussions on the subject.

Authorised Access Worker logs on and searches for requested information.

Throughout the process the Originating Social Worker and Authorised Access Worker should work together to identify what is relevant information is identified on Facebook. If there is any uncertainty or disagreement about the process, or the information which is being identified, there should be a discussion with Service Manager whose team is managing the case.

If it becomes apparent during the viewing of the site that it may be useful to look at Facebook pages belonging to another person, this needs to be processed as a separate request, and should be specifically brought to the attention of the Service Director.

A copy of any information which is identified as relevant must be taken and saved as an electronic document which should then be provided to the appropriate Service manager and service Director.

Once obtained the copied information becomes part of the service user’s formal social care record. It should be placed on Care Director in the “Assessments” box and must be retained and if requested made available as part of a data protection disclosure.

Authorised Access Worker completes an Investigation Log (Appendix 2) and passes to Originating Social Worker.

Originating Social Worker assesses the information and finalises the Investigation Log.

Originating Social Worker must then share the Investigation Log with their team manager, Service Manager and Service Director.

Appendix 1: Social Networking

Click here to view Appendix 1: Social Networking.

Appendix 2: Social Networking Sites

Click here to view Appendix 2: Social Networking Sites.

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