[pathy]

I see you didn't read the article. The basis for the article is a NYT interview with a SVP at Google, claiming that the brainteasers are not useful (among other things). Surely that is good source? I haven't got a clue if Google actually used these kinds of questions but the interview sure seem to suggest it.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/20/business/in-head-hunting-b...

That said, the riddles listed are of course a bit clickbaity but they did not conjure the story out of thin air.

[jmillikin]

The same list of riddle questions has been circulating for at least twenty years. Before Google existed, it was credited to Microsoft. I know they've been explicitly banned at Google for many years, and have seen no evidence that they were ever in common use at either company.