How personal should interviews get?

So, I just had a hiring process fall through at the final stage and the last interview was... weird. The questions were digging uncomfortably far back into my early life - I was asked about my origins, my childhood, my parents, growing up. By the time we got to my work history, I was *really* off balance and struggled to come with good responses. So now I'm wondering - why did they go there? If you were hiring an engineer, how much detail would you like to know about their past?

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