When I interviewed for my first real job they included a programming "test". It was basic C stuffs (really, more C pointer focused). Things like 4 swap functions, each incorrectly implemented, what are the resulting values of a and b after running swap(a,b) or swap(&a,&b), etc.
Apparently, I found out after getting hired on, I was the only one to have ever gotten every question correct (note: I was not their only hire, the code there made sense once I heard this, I'm not there anymore). So I guess I shouldn't be surprised that sys admin jobs see similar problems. But it still really bothers me for some reason. This is fairly basic knowledge (telnet/ssh for admins, C and pointers for embedded systems programmers).
Because once you've logged in to the box, administration via telnet and SSH is exactly the same. It's not that they don't have admin skills, they just don't have updated security skills.
It's not awesome, but if the interviewer doesn't think to ask about SSH skills, and the interviewee doesn't realize their skill is out of date, it's easy to miss.
How often is the focus on what to do once logged in, as compared to how to log in in the first place?
But yes, once you start taking user credentials, you need to move to something like FTPS or SFTP (urgh... double standards).
It seems pretty genius to me.
I couldn't help but laugh though: "telnet, a command-line tool often used by professionals to manage servers."