A friend of mine from high school bragged that he achieved some measure of infamy in middle school by hacking Diablo in such a manner that it was possible to duplicate items. He then claimed Blizzard offered him an internship -- again, in high school -- for showing them how he did it. I knew about the incident (oh, the wages of a misspent youth -- Diablo, not hacking), but always figured he was embellishing most of it.

Some years later, sure enough, guess who was in the Diablo II credits.

Maybe it's a double bluff thing, like when Valve caught the Half Life leaker: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-02-21-the-boy-who-sto...

I actually thought this article was significantly better than the parent article, and is definitely worth a read.

I don't see anything in that statement equivalent to "hired". Is there another source that indicates this?

I agree, it sounds as though they are "reeducating" him into a white hat and not necessarily hiring him on as a employee. It would surprise me if they actually hired him right now because he had set up a phishing scam. It is good though that they are working with him vs throwing the book at him especially for one so young.

Hired a phisher? Thought they were hiring someone who was making wallhacks or aimbots or anything like that. That would've made much more sense. Put a guy like that into security!

I'm not surprised this has happened but I wouldn't expect this from Microsoft nor with a person who has defrauded others after hacking a system.

Huh, I should be happy for Microsoft hiring a practiced phisher. Sounds like a good advancement for them.