Michael Rendell, head of HR services, told Recruiter that it was only a matter of time before candidates took employers to ETs claiming they had been discriminated against on the grounds of age, sex, or ethnicity, after checking candidate profiles on sites such as Facebook.

“Employers may look at these sites, but they cannot use what they see to discriminate on the grounds of sex or ethnicity,” Rendell warned.

Rendell accepted it was difficult for employers to ignore something they had seen, however, he urged them to be careful. “Not only must they not do it [discriminate] but they must be seen not to discriminate,” he said.

Rendell’s comments came after the German cabinet’s decision last week to endorse proposals making it illegal for employers to monitor job candidates’ social networking postings.

David Mason, international talent acquisition director at global engineering services company CH2M Hill, told Recruiter that such a ban would be “completely wrong” as people had voluntarily put the information about themselves out there into a public forum.

Mason acknowledged the risk of recruiters discriminating on the basis of a candidate’s social networking profile, however, he argued that this was no higher than the risk of them discriminating on the basis of someone’s name or their CV.

“Good companies will have processes and procedures in place [to stop discrimination] and this extends to social media just as much as a plain CV,” added Mason.

John-Paul Toner, a director at construction recruiter Contract Scotland, told Recruiter he could understand the rationale behind any proposed ban, however he didn’t foresee such a ban having an impact on his own company.

“Recruitment decisions should be based on individual suitability for a position: their qualifications, experience and references rather than reliance on any personal lifestyle profile,” said Toner.

He added: “I am not sure how practical or enforceable any ban would be.