> "We're looking for foreign-sounding names."

NAL but that's like a question you'd get on an HR training test. Yes, that's illegal, regardless of motive.

The obvious reason being this is an astroturfing post?

This violates the HN rule, "Assume good faith." I'm not a rules-absolutist by any means, but there is nothing materially here to reasonably validate an accusation of astroturfing. We simply can't know.

In real life, people speak to each other casually. I have heard the gendered version of the exact same sentence from a hiring manager at my (very large) employer.