01
What a proxy interview is
In a proxy interview, the person the employer is assessing is not the person doing the work of the interview. It takes four common forms.
| Form | What happens |
|---|---|
| Stand-in | Someone else joins the call in the candidate’s name, often with the camera off or a poor connection as cover. |
| Hidden helper | The candidate is on camera, but someone off screen hears the questions and feeds the answers. |
| Remote control | Another person controls the candidate’s computer from elsewhere and types the code or the answers. |
| Switch after the offer | One person passes the interviews and a different person turns up for the job. |
02
Why it is growing
Remote interviews made it cheap to send a stand-in, and paid proxy services advertise openly. In a 2025 Checkr survey, 35% of US hiring managers said someone other than the listed applicant had taken part in a virtual interview. In India, Infosys paused hiring tests for about 20,000 candidates after finding impersonation.
The sources for these figures, and what they do not show, are on our research page.
03
Signs an interviewer can watch for
None of these proves anything on its own, but together they are worth a second look.
- The camera stays off, or the picture freezes whenever a hard question is asked.
- Lip movement and voice drift out of step for long stretches.
- Pauses before every answer, then fluent, complete replies.
- Eyes repeatedly move to one side, or the candidate listens to something you cannot hear.
- Typing starts before the candidate has had time to think, or the cursor moves while their hands are still.
- The person on the first day of work looks or sounds different from the one you interviewed.
A careful interviewer will notice some of this, but not while also running the interview, and not on every call.
04
What Polar flags
Polar runs alongside the interviews you already hold, on Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Webex or any other video call app. While the call runs it flags:
- Remote-control tools such as AnyDesk and TeamViewer, and setups that have been tampered with.
- Signs in the call audio of help from someone off camera.
- Interview-assistance software and windows the interviewer cannot see.
Each finding comes with its evidence in a report for the candidate. Your team reviews it and makes the decision: a finding is a signal, never a verdict. See how it works.
05
Who uses proxy interview detection
- Staffing and RPO firms, whose clients may never meet the candidate and expect evidence that the interview was clean.
- Technology and services companies hiring remote engineers at volume.
- Assessment and interview platforms that want integrity checks inside their own product.
06
Questions
- Can you detect a proxy interview on Zoom, Google Meet or Microsoft Teams?
- Yes. Polar works alongside interviews on any video call app, including Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft Teams and Webex. Interviewers install nothing; the candidate runs a small program from their private link that needs no installation.
- Does Polar decide whether the candidate cheated?
- No. Polar shows its findings with the evidence behind each one. Your team reviews them and makes the hiring decision.
- What does the candidate see?
- Before anything is collected, the candidate sees what is collected, how long it is kept and their rights, and gives consent. They can close Polar at any time, and the report shows that it was closed.
- Is an in-person round a better answer?
- Where it is possible, it helps. It is often not possible for staffing firms, whose clients never meet the candidate, or for panels spread across cities and countries.