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Blizzard Recruiters Asked Hacker If She ‘Liked Being Penetrated’ at Job Fair
- Havoc 5y agoBlizzard is on a roll with their PR
- dnzkw 5y agoThere's proof this actually happened, right?
- ev1 5y ago> And yet when she shared her experience with other women at the conference, she found that she wasn’t alone—many others had received the same treatment from the Blizzard recruitment booth as well I would doubt that a company would publicly post this due to liability otherwise
- taurath 5y agoTurns out journalists check their sources, lest they get sued for libel
- ev1 5y agoI mean, some don't. But that quote was apparently from a publicly posted (on the company Twitter), redacted letter to Blizzard from the person's employer after Blizzard tried to become a customer.
- ta392828 5y agoTurns out people lie (even in court, but let's just focus on the innocent until proven guilty part) https://reason.com/2018/10/17/seneca-valley-mean-girls-false-sexual/ https://reason.com/2018/10/17/seneca-valley-mean-girls-false...
- taurath 5y agoAnd when there’s a documented pattern to the point that lawsuits are filed with evidence and testimony, AND the person telling the story has very little to personally gain (and a lot to lose since conservative Twitter tends to send death threats over things like this), you tend to take the one more likely. Further, if you read the article there is a literal whole company with a business relationship that was cancelled with blizzard over this. I think you really really really should do some soul searching on what makes you have a knee-jerk reaction that they're making it up. But also, news organizations are cognizant that their credibility takes a hit if they just publish every single accusation regardless of attribution.
- techbio 5y agoThe t-shirt she chose to wear to a career event showing a [sexual] double-entendre is not asking for abuse obviously, but demanding some kind of attention. The entire video game business has a [lack of] culture problem. That the Blizzard boys went so far in embarrassing themselves is theirs to own. Edit: Flagged? I'm sorry. If you read the article, the inappropriate jokes were targeted to her t-shirt reading "Penetration Expert". This is stupid on top of stupid.
- taurath 5y agoBefore this devolves, please put yourself in the shoes of a woman wanting to work in the industry and knowing a bunch of drunk men not only think hitting on you is appropriate, but also they’re the people that hold the keys to your hiring role and future promotions. You’d stay the fuck away.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- tester756 5y agoand then you read whole story and realize that she was the one that was """"playful"""" too, that t-shirt had purpose in my opinion - for lulz. >"One of them asked me when was the last time I was personally penetrated, if I liked being penetrated, and how often I got penetrated," Don't get me wrong, it's terrible.
- taurath 5y agoReading the whole story makes it worse, not better. Telling someone, dressed as WHATEVER inquiring about a job "are you lost" and "are you here with your boyfriend" is just as bad if not worse. She's an attendee at a security conference wearing a tshirt. They're representatives of a company trying to hire people at that conference.
- tracedddd 5y agoBehavior like this is extremely common in the security community, and not even just towards women. Unfortunately many people in the industry are essentially socially maligned outcasts and fail to see how inappropriate it is to use this same behavior towards strangers, especially women, at a conference. It’s not a hacker IRC channel with people you’ve known for a decade who appreciate low effort dark humor, it’s sexual harassment.
- ev1 5y agoIn aforementioned hacker IRC channel there is probably at least context or knowledge that they're just screwing around with the double meaning of pentesting. I see it pretty commonly with any combination of genders, including m/m anal-related somewhat tasteless jokes. In this case it was led with something akin to aww are you lost? where is your boyfriend?, which already provides really shitty harassment context. There's also a pretty large difference when you're in a chill groupchat compared to _representing your employer at a conference_
- munk-a 5y ago> context or knowledge that they're just screwing around with the double meaning of pentesting. Can we just like - stop that though? We're not in middle school anymore and it's not particularly funny of a joke. Statements made to break the ice and provide a more social environment are fine for easing technical discussions - especially when introverts are so common in our field - but there are legions of other topics in the security research field that can yield rich soil for merriment.
- threatofrain 5y agoThe person in question, for reasons unknown to us (perhaps peer pressure), also decided to perpetuate this kind of comedy with clothing that read "When was the last time you were penetrated?" It seems quite unfair to expect to dish out this kind of comedy without taking some of it back.
- BrandoElFollito 5y agoI do not know how extremely common it is. I am in the industry for 25 years and have participated (and in the vast majority of cases - spoken) at many conferences. I have never seen it happening. I am an average man and met other average men and women at the conferences and it was like any other meetings: sometimes interesting, lots of chit-chat, lots of boring people etc. I never saw anyone harass others - my experience is in Europe, the US and a bunch of conferences in Asia. I have also regrettably not witnessed the executive orgies everyone talks about, despite having been at all the right after parties. This DOES NOT mean that it does not exist - the case in the article is an example of assholes who statistically exist in all populations who should have been told to fuck off by someone around. And shove their sense of humor in a dark place of their body. I am just kindly challenging the extremely common part.
- tiahura 5y agoThe older I get, the more I think “yeah, so?” This is the sort of behavior that 10M years of sexual reproduction has delivered. Males of a certain age range tend to have testosterone and want to hump everything that is vaguely feminine. Insisting that we act completely unnaturally seems futile and counterproductive. Castigating based on a natural response seems unfair.
- duxup 5y ago>Insisting that we act completely unnaturally seems futile and counterproductive. That's how we have civilization...
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- jedberg 5y agoFor millions of years the males would kill other males in competing tribes for resources. Luckily we have moved past that and are able to use our higher order brain functions to suppress that desire in most cases, so we can live in a peaceful civilization.
- s1artibartfast 5y agoThe desire to fight and human sexuality are a bit different in this respect. You can imagine and want to live In a society free of violence but sexuality is with us for the foreseeable future. It is also a lot more subjective and difficult set standards around sexual behavior while it is easy to define violence and say what behaviors have no place in the workplace. Sexual advances are more tricky because the same exact behavior may receive a positive or negative reception.
- cycomanic 5y agoDo you have children? Do you teach them that this behaviour is OK? What about beating up random people? We can also make some argument that those also came about for some evolutionary reason and testoron...
- duxup 5y agoI don't get it. I just don't. I don't even WANT to have that conversation with a random person... What is with these people? Gotta be honest I'd even be a little uncomfortable about the shirt... the whole situation is wonky.
- binkHN 5y agoYou can see the shirt she wore at https://scontent.fapa1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.18172-8/23467459_1764130716933568_1577781541875017446_o.jpg?_nc_cat=103&ccb=1-3&_nc_sid=973b4a&_nc_ohc=vLOyScseZEAAX8yQK_s&_nc_ht=scontent.fapa1-1.fna&oh=2e49228c047f6a4b876bf173f4321114&oe=61295026 https://scontent.fapa1-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.18172-8/2346745.... While I don’t condone this behavior, the back of the shirt says “When was the last time you were penetrated…”
- jaywalk 5y agoWhich behavior do you not condone? Hers or the recruiters? Because it would be pretty damn hypocritical to be OK with one but not the other.
- foobarian 5y agoPerhaps it's time for the security industry to pick more appropriate word for "penetration" like much of the rest of the tech world did for various other outdated offensive keywords.
- techbio 5y agoGood point, but then the new word shows up on an adult-themed t-shirt.
- rcoveson 5y agoYour username contains "foobar", which comes from the military acronym "FUBAR", which stands for "fucked up beyond all recognition". Should the tech world move away from foobar as well? "Penetration" is not as offensive as "kill". Would you submit the s/SIGKILL/SIGNINE patch to any project?
- swayvil 5y agoA female hacker? Unheard of! EDIT yeah we live in a post-joke world
- ta392828 5y agoI think it's more of a HN culture that discourages reddit like posts which add nothing to the conversation (besides the joke) > The most important principle on HN, though, is to make thoughtful comments. Thoughtful in both senses: civil and substantial. The test for substance is a lot like it is for links. Does your comment teach us anything? There are two ways to do that: by pointing out some consideration that hadn't previously been mentioned, and by giving more information about the topic, perhaps from personal experience. Whereas comments like "LOL!" or worse still, "That's retarded!" teach us nothing. https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html
- swayvil 5y agoMy words were brief but what they imply covers 10 good clear paragraphs. The meaning of which you sidestepped like a greased wad of jello.
- EthanHeilman 5y agoThe chorus of people rushing to make the same old jokes over and over again really degrades the discussion on reddit and I'm glad to see it is much less welcome on Hn. "Keep me up till five because all your stars are out, and for no other reason" There is only so much screen space avaliable. I want it all to be signal. The sole reason I post under my own name is that I found I was just posting on forums without adding anything to the discussion. I got pissed off at my myself and decided to put all my posts under my own name. Now every time I post I ask am I adding anything of value? If you go through my post history I'm sad to say you'll find instances where I didn't add anything of value. I feel bad about that, but I reflect on my failure and try again.
- swayvil 5y agoYes, watching you stroke yourself is quite refreshing, comparatively.
- onlyafan 5y agoNot to condone this behavior, but I think it's absolutely worth noting that she was wearing a shirt that said "Penetration Expert" on the front (which the article mentions) which is reasonably mild. But the shirt also says on the back, if you follow the link, "When was the Last Time you were PENETRATED..." [capitalization sic] (which the article conveniently leaves out). I've gotta say, that is way more sexual of a joke than I'd personally be comfortable wearing in a business casual environment, and I can't help but feel that if you wear that you're really opening yourself up to people teasing you with "Oh yeah, when was the last time you were penetrated?". There's a big difference between "she was asking for it because of her clothes" - bad argument - and "she chose to wear a shirt with an overtly sexual joke on it and people repeated the joke to her".
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- bogwog 5y ago> One of the Blizzard employees first asked if she was lost, another one asked if she was at the conference with her boyfriend, and another one asked if she even knew what pentesting was. Was that on the shirt too?
- bequanna 5y agoTake the unverified stories from all parties with a huge grain of salt. The incentives to misrepresent the truth and lie/exaggerate/downplay are there for every party involved.
- taurath 5y ago> "One of my C-suite executives saw that you had been added to our CRM database, and shared a very troubling and upsetting story with me: > Back in 2015 at the Black Hat USA security conference in Las Vegas Blizzard had a recruitment booth in the “Career Zone” section of the vendor area. As the name implies, the purpose of the Career Zone is to connect hackers seeking jobs with companies seeking to employ them. My executive (whom I should clarify was not employed with us at the time, but rather was employed as a senior vulnerability researcher at large security consulting firm) approached the Blizzard booth to inquire about open positions; however instead of discussing potential job opportunities with her, the Blizzard recruiters ridiculed her for being a woman. They asked her if she was lost; if her boyfriend brought her to the conference; if she even knew what the conference was about; if she knew was penetration testing was, and how often she got penetrated; and a slew of other extremely inappropriate and wholly unprofessional questions.” Or just believe the women in the face of credible evidence. The lengths many HN commenters will go to to cast FUD upon any accusation of sexism in the industry is a pretty clear indicator of how much sexism is in the industry.
- a-dub 5y agonot gonna lie. a big part of me groans every time i see "penetration testing." i suppose maybe that might have been funny in junior high school or something. but, seriously?
- OrvalWintermute 5y agoWhen I explain I worked as a penetration tester and provided hacking demonstrations, for some reason, both male and female colleagues have responded with naughty innuendo. There is something to do with the word penetration that makes people feel as though they MUST comment sexually on it.
- CodeGlitch 5y agoYeah I usually just say "cyber security testing". People outside the industry can at least make an educated guess at what that means.
- andrewmcwatters 5y agoIt's inevitable that in a few years this whole practice will be called vulnerability testing or some variation thereof because of nonsense like this.
- techbio 5y ago"Invasive testing" fits for me, and it's not cute.
- vsareto 5y agoIf you see anyone trying to make a joke about penetration testing and penetration, stay well the fuck away and tell everyone you know to stay well the fuck away. Not only are they being inappropriate by trying it with people at a security event, they're probably an idiot for ever thinking it was funny. But aside from that, we probably should retire "penetration tester" as a job title because dipshits can't resist being dipshits and there's enough barriers for women in security as it is.
- Shadonototro 5y agoso that's how they recruit people? if they have sexual experience? no wonder people are leaving WoW and their recent games were underperforming (Warcraft 3 Reforged for example)
- ziffusion 5y ago> "One of them asked me when was the last time I was personally penetrated, if I liked being penetrated, and how often I got penetrated," Mitchell told Waypoint. "I was furious and felt humiliated so I took the free swag and left." Took the free swag and left?!