here where I am its perfectly acceptable for therapists, employers, doctors you name it to google their clients, patients, employees and so on. even agencies like social security, social services agencies use google these days for screening and other forms of information. we live in the computer era now where even phone books, birth certificates and so on, are online and how is one to for example call a patient if they don't google the person to find their address and phone number.

most mental health agencies in America now include in their rights and responsibilities papers questions like

"this agencies uses (website name) for background checks, obtaining clients addresses and phone numbers and does co operate with law enforcement, furthermore this agency does employ the use of video recording for security and patient safety purposes"

Another statement / question on rights and responsibility paper work I have encountered with treatment providers of all kinds is..."this agency has the right to use the internet services if comfortable please include your … (spaces to write whether you want texting, emailing, messaging to your social network private messaging option) please be aware that all texting, emailing messaging options should any conversations take place those conversations between treatment provider and patient will be printed and added to patient files. by filling in these optional services you are consenting to the use of our internet services that this agency provides."

in other words the internet "google" has taken the place of paper versions... a paper phone book on the living room stand, a paper letter/ memo mailed to your home delivered by your post man. the background checks that treatment providers do to verify your personal information that you have willfully placed on your intake forms. before computers these things were done by calling around to various agencies to verify your information, now with computers this happens by googling.

treatment providers who's agency has internet services that they provide with their clients still have to abide by privacy laws. example if my treatment provider googles me to find my phone number she may find I have a facebook page, what do facebook pages contain in a persons profile …. a phone number. so she may end up opening my facebook profile for my phone number and curiousity catches her with that colorful meme on my page, and in reading that meme discover something above or below it that I have not disclosed to her. she can bring it up with me but she can not disclose what she now knows about me to others UNLESS what she discovered was a crime, in which case she is bound by law to report it.

anyone that has a problem with treatment providers googling them should have a conversation with their treatment providers and make sure that they did not supply their email, twitter/ facebook and so forth on the standard paperwork the mental health agency has you do, you can also write in the space provided for more information that you opt out of your therapist and the mental health agency using the internet services for texting, emailing and so on, then give complete information on how you would like to receive notifications, letters and so on that mental health agencies sometimes need to notify you about. this way they will know that your treatment provider is not to google you for anything. not even to text your cell phones email accounts, social networking sites messaging services.