About half of workers said their employers have no business snooping on their social-networking profiles and blogs, according to a recent poll by consultants Deloitte. A larger number, however - two-thirds - said the boss has a right to know how they're portraying themselves and representing the company on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, LinkedIn and the like.

These conflicting viewpoints show how protective many people can be about their privacy, but also illustrate that they understand how their actions can reflect an employer's brand and their own job status, said Deloitte chairman Sharon Allen. It's the employer's job to promote the recognition that an individual's online presence can reflect on a larger corporation, she said.

Sixty-one per cent of those polled said corporate monitoring of their sites or profiles wouldn't affect their posted content, as many have already accepted their information is in the public eye and have adjusted accordingly.

Most kept their online lives and work lives separate.

Of those who use social-networking sites or blogs, 96 per cent said they do not mention their co-workers, clients or supervisors. Nearly 80 per cent say they do not visit such sites on work time.

Despite Allen's warning of the corporate responsibility to administer rules on online activity, about half of those surveyed said there's no work policy, or that they're not aware of corporate rules, guiding employee content or usage of social-networking sites.