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Who is Soham Parekh, the serial moonlighter Silicon Valley can't stop hiring?

(techcrunch.com)
45 points nradov | 10 comments | 04 Jul 25 22:58 UTC | HN request time: 0.002s | source | bottom
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sorcerer-mar ◴[04 Jul 25 23:29 UTC] No.44468836[source]▶
I really think people need a hobby or something. Cool we found the 99th percentiler of a thing that everyone knows was happening. All it is is someone who's phenomenally good at interviewing and decided to use that to defraud a bunch of companies.

Is there much else to learn? This is simply not as interesting a story as it's being made out to be.

replies(2): >>44468922 #>>44469273 #
1. esafak ◴[05 Jul 25 00:57 UTC] No.44469273[source]▶
It means you need to be diligent when interviewing people; do background checks.
replies(1): >>44469406 #
2. sorcerer-mar ◴[05 Jul 25 01:26 UTC] No.44469406[source]▶
What sensible level of background check would've caught this without incurring stupid costs given that 99.99999% of applicants are not Soham?
replies(1): >>44469430 #
3. esafak ◴[05 Jul 25 01:31 UTC] No.44469430[source]▶
Use your judgement. I do most of my filtering before the interview, from the resume and LinkedIn. Get references from his last company. If something feels off, probe some more. You develop a nose for it.
replies(1): >>44469443 #
4. sorcerer-mar ◴[05 Jul 25 01:34 UTC] No.44469443{3}[source]▶
Got it, so seems like there's nothing to learn here, like I said initially.
replies(1): >>44469470 #
5. esafak ◴[05 Jul 25 01:40 UTC] No.44469470{4}[source]▶
IF you're trying to say that you've interviewed people like Soham in a roundabout way you can just say so. Given everyone else's reaction, they're obviously new to these scammers and will be adjusting their hiring practices.

Not everybody has interviewed a North Korean hacker with a real-time deepfake avatar either...

replies(1): >>44469500 #
6. sorcerer-mar ◴[05 Jul 25 01:49 UTC] No.44469500{5}[source]▶
No, I am asking what is there to learn. If there were something to learn, you (or anyone else) could’ve said: “you should do [this thing] differently”

“Don’t hire people like this guy” is circular. It’s not meaningful information. There’s nothing to learn!

Background checks would not and did not detect him.

replies(1): >>44469651 #
7. esafak ◴[05 Jul 25 02:23 UTC] No.44469651{6}[source]▶
I am not saying that at all, am I? I am saying DO BACKGROUND CHECKS. If the previous company says "He hasn't actually done any work yet" you would have avoided the problem.

I can't tell you what to do differently because I don't know what you are doing. But I can say you can catch him, and others have caught him, so why can't you?

replies(1): >>44469674 #
8. sorcerer-mar ◴[05 Jul 25 02:30 UTC] No.44469674{7}[source]▶
First, background checks are obvious and I don't know any startup of any scale that's hiring engineers "without background checks."

But typical background checks would not catch someone doing this, and in fact did not catch him several times, clearly.

Background checks do not alert you to other business who claim to have recently hired someone, so it's not clear how this helps whatsoever. He had references, he had a LinkedIn, etc. etc. Your solution is made up.

If you believe background checks would help, then answer my prior question: which type of background check? The standard ones would not detect this!

replies(1): >>44470131 #
9. esafak ◴[05 Jul 25 04:45 UTC] No.44470131{8}[source]▶
Ask about his work! Everybody specifically said he did not actually do any.
replies(1): >>44471972 #
10. sorcerer-mar ◴[05 Jul 25 11:27 UTC] No.44471972{9}[source]▶
Ah, so you are supposed to conjure from the tea leaves all of the employers he has burned and hasn't listed on his LinkedIn or references. Gee wiz.