As someone who does hiring, I can say that (at least my organization) has not conspired with any other company. I suspect what you're seeing is the result of wh

As someone who does hiring, I can say that (at least my organization) has not conspired with any other company. I suspect what you're seeing is the result of what I'm seeing: it is extremely challenging to assess a candidate remotely. I'm not saying all of the things you mentioned are a good solution to that problem, but I do believe they are how some organizations are (poorly) attempting to solve it. We have now hired 3 (that we know of) people who turned out to be different from the person we interviewed. I suspect one other, and one of my colleagues suspects a fifth. The is a problem for several reasons. We have talked about many of the ideas that you mentioned, and tried some, but ultimately decided that they are too burdensome. So, now we only hire remote people in cities where a long term employee already works and they can attend the interview in person to verify the person being interviewed in not cheating or getting assistance in any way. Our solution isn't perfect, but it's what we're doing until we can find a better solution.