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That sounds so intrusive. It wouldn’t be amiss, once hired and enough trust has been built, to try to get HR to drop that practice.

Companies generally aren’t monsters! They don’t want to break the law, they are risk averse and don’t want to be sued, and want to attract good people. Most worth their salt would be receptive to some constructive criticism about how invasive it is to have unsolicited interrogations from a third party.