I worked for a company that setup "blind" interviews, for the early stage. You'd apply for a position, make up your own alias and would have a "general chat" over IM.

If that went well then you'd have a "real" second/final interview. The system was designed to remove some of the bias from the process, and seemed to work well for that.

We've gone a different route. We give a very easy technical task as the first thing, and everyone that passes it gets an interview. Since we're typically hiring junior devs, this usually extends to "almost-passing" a lot of the time, too. Though, after the recent rounds of interviews and someone who didn't work out, I think we're going to insist on a fully correct project in the future. It really isn't that hard. It isn't technically stuff they fail usually. They fail to read and follow the requirements.

I have access to the name when I'm reviewing the code, but I specifically don't look at it until afterwards. I'm sure it wouldn't make a difference, but I figure there's no harm in doing it that way, so why not?

That's very progressive!

I struggle with the opposite in Europe. (Many) Less progressive companies still ask for CVs with date of birth and photograph.

Even if they're fine with "blind" CVs, the first interview will invariably be just a 15min video call with someone from HR who doesn't know the first thing about the position, and is just there to look at your face and listen to you reiterate your CV.

I'm personally used to submitting CVs with dates of birth, but I've never submitted one with a photograph. I guess it must depend where you're based.

(I've worked in the UK for most of my life, but I've been located in Finland for the past five years, or so.)

Ah yes, for completeness, this is in Switzerland.

It's also not often specified explicitly - I notably recently saw the first job offer stating "we consider a complete application to include DOB and photograph".

It has, however, come up every single time when talking to third party recruiters. Maybe they carry additional bias.

Live in Ireland (age 48). I've never put my photo or DOB on an application

How did you know that you were talking to the same person both times?

Interesting question! It wouldn't be too difficult to fake things, we'd setup a dedicated email alias for each candidate so "$id@jobs.example.com", but it wouldn't be impossible for people to get a friend to do the first part.

I know it crossed my mind that multiple people could be sharing a keyboard during the blind-sessions.

Do companies hiring exclusively via video calls (due to covid) actually make sure that the person is the same in each round? Or is the same person who shows up on day one?

The probability is being caught is much higher, and therefore reduces the probability of people trying to cheat. I also imagine you would be interviewed by people you are working with, so clearly they would notice in day one.