Would You Hire a Former Black Hat?

Mark Zenson asks: "Understanding the mindset of a hacker and the likes of one may be useful to counter security attacks, but apparently companies still object to hiring former, or even reformed, black hats." The article asks this question of several executives in the industry and for various reasons, many of them were skeptical to the idea of hiring such people. Would you give black hats a second chance if you were in their position?

of course I would

[EllynGeek]

If I worked at Hewlett-Packard.

Re:direct objects

[Anonymous Coward]

Would you give black hats a second chance if you were in there position? Satisfied?

Re:It All Depends on Their Maturity

[ajohn505]

Man, you are really badass.

Re:It All Depends on Their Maturity

[Hal_Porter]

Can they work with people?

I never killed a coworker. You can't do much damage with a cheap keyboard, no matter how hard you swing it.

You have Dells, right? No problem. Wow, I aced this one.

Can they dress well?

Most days, I can pull on a pair of pants and grab a T shirt off the floor as I walk out the door. I find I'm more productive barefoot.

Do they shower?

Once I got pretty wet cycling to the office on my BMX.

Are they capable of staying after normal work hours every now and then to see to something getting finished?

I'll stay till noon if I was too busy to get the work done at night.

Are they sensitive to other people and their surroundings?

You bet I'm sensitive. Hell, ask my ex boss. I'd have called him for a reference if it wasn't for the court order.

Re:It All Depends on Their Maturity

[Anonymous Coward]

So... shouldn't you be working on that bug?

Generally, yes

[iamacat]

• Should you hire a graphics designer who ever smoked pot?
  
• Marry a 30 year old guy/woman who had some flings in college?
  
• Hire a developer with 10 years of experience who got root access to a few university service to impress girls?
  

There are always risks involved, but excluding top 1/3 of candidates from your list is stupid. If you are good at something, chances are you played around a bit in your formative years.

Re:It All Depends on Their Maturity

[Anonymous Coward]

I was employed by a small company where I rapidly rose to the position of being a network admin

I'd like to read the rest of your comment, but I just can't stop laughing every time I read "rose to the position of being a network admin"...

Re:It All Depends on Their Maturity

[macmastery]

.....police vehicles don't signal their turns or lane changes.

OMG!

My wife must be an undercover police officer!