Can you be fired in Illinois for what you do or post off the clock? 820 ILCS 55/5 explained

Illinois has a rule on what workers do in their own time, but it is narrower than the ones in Colorado and North Dakota. It is section 5 of the Right to Privacy in the Workplace Act, 820 ILCS 55, and it covers the use of lawful products, not lawful activity in general (820 ILCS 55/5). This page explains what the Act says about off-duty conduct and online posts, based on the text published by the Illinois General Assembly.

The short answer: an Illinois employer may not refuse to hire, fire or otherwise disadvantage someone because they use lawful products off the employer's premises during nonworking and non-call hours. "Lawful products" means products that are legal under state law (55/5(a)). A social media post is not a product, so our reading, not a court ruling, is that section 5 does not protect posts as such. What the Act does protect online is the privacy of personal accounts: an employer may not demand passwords or access, but it may look at information in the public domain (55/10(b)).

What section 5 protects

• Lawful products: products legal under Illinois law, used off the employer's premises during nonworking and non-call hours. An employee counts as on call when scheduled with at least 24 hours' notice to be on standby or responsible for work tasks (55/5(a)).
• Every stage of the job: the rule covers refusing to hire, discharge, and any other disadvantage in pay, terms, conditions or privileges of employment (55/5(a)).
• Exceptions: the section yields where the law specifically provides otherwise, naming section 10-50 of the Cannabis Regulation and Tax Act. It does not apply to a nonprofit whose primary purposes include discouraging the public from using a lawful product, or to use that impairs an employee's ability to do their assigned duties. Employers may also price health, disability or life insurance differently by product use, if the difference reflects a real cost and employees get a statement of the rates (55/5(a)-(c)).

What the Act says about online activity

• Personal accounts are off limits: an employer or prospective employer may not request, require or coerce a username, password or other access to a personal online account, make a worker log in in front of it, or require them to invite it into a group or add it as a contact. It may not penalize a worker or refuse to hire an applicant for refusing (55/10(b)(1)). Our full guide is the Illinois social media password law.
• Public posts are not: the Act does not stop an employer from obtaining information about an employee or applicant that is in the public domain (55/10(b)(3)(A)).
• Reported content: an employer may ask a worker to share specific content that has been reported to it, without asking for login details, to check legal compliance or to investigate specific information about leaked confidential data, legal breaches or work-related misconduct (55/10(b)(3)(C)).
• Use at work: an employer may bar the use of personal accounts during business hours, on business property, on employer-supplied devices or on its network, to the extent other laws allow (55/10(b)(3)(C)(v)).

Enforcement

A person aggrieved by a violation of the Act may sue in circuit court without first going to the Department of Labor, alone or for similarly situated workers, within 3 years. Relief includes a civil penalty of $100 to $1,000 per violation, and where the violation relates to the denial or loss of a job, reinstatement, back pay with interest and a $10,000 civil penalty, plus damages, costs, expert fees and reasonable attorney's fees (55/17). A worker may instead complain to the Illinois Department of Labor, and the Attorney General and some nonprofits and labor organizations can also bring actions (55/15, 55/16). Firing or otherwise discriminating against a worker for complaining or taking part in a proceeding under the Act is a petty offense (55/15(f)).

What this means in practice

• Workers: in Illinois, the off-duty rule in this Act protects lawful product use, and your personal accounts are protected from forced access, but a public post that an employer finds is not shielded by this Act. Keep personal accounts private if that matters to you, and keep work and personal posting apart. Other laws, such as those on discrimination or protected complaints, may still apply to a particular post.
• Employers: do not ask for logins or access, and do not act on lawful product use off site and off call unless an exception applies. A social media policy can cover use at work and on company devices, and public posts are not off limits under this Act, but check other laws before acting on one.

Two states read for this site go further: Colorado protects lawful off-duty activity from dismissal, and North Dakota protects it across hiring, pay and firing. Minnesota, like Illinois, protects only lawful products, in its case consumable ones, and so does Nevada. Illinois rules on AI in hiring are in Illinois AI hiring laws.

All three state laws side by side: off-duty conduct laws in the US.

This page covers Illinois only and is general information based on the Right to Privacy in the Workplace Act as published by the Illinois General Assembly when checked on 4 November 2026, not legal advice. Check for later amendments before relying on it.