Hiring the hackers is a terrible idea. If they had done it ethically, yes. But do you really want to hire someone who has already displayed highly unethical behavior, and is likely a ticking timebomb? There are plenty of smart, ethical hackers out there.

I don't think you can draw those conclusion from the evidence presented. I would guess that quite a lot of the top white hat hackers today sharpened their skills early with some highly unethical behavior of their own.

A good example of this would be how Chris Putnam got hired at Facebook.

http://www.quora.com/How-did-Chris-Putnam-get-hired-at-Faceb...

Oh wow, I just realized that Chris Putnam is the same guy who used to post on the Something Awful forums back in 2003-2004 or so.

I remember him getting trolled out of there after showing any kind of ambition beyond posting on the forums. Same thing happened to the guy who started Imageshack (originally an image host for the SA forums), Eli Hodapp (who later became one of the main TouchArcade writers), and probably some others I don't remember.

Well dang, good for him!

Damn. I had no idea that being run out of SA with your tail between your legs back in the day was such a predictor of success. Who'd have thought it?

Only if they demonstrated great skill - which I don't think happened in this case (but I'm no security expert either)

And great restraint/maturity. Which didn't happen either.

Or do like the FBI and offer them a job, when they come for the interview they get frogmarched into the police cruiser.

Valve did that, the FBI was just the tool that was used for the job.

I'm struck by the similarity in some respects of the two cases. I would guess that the same people that got really upset about Valve doing that would be a bit saddened by this, too.