Apple, Cisco and eBay contractors have been banned from the H1-B Visa program for wage theft. The contractors, Scopus Consulting Group Inc. and Orian Engineers Inc., both from Sunnyvale, were cited for short-changing workers approximately $84,000, according to a recent Silicon Valley Business Journal article.
Scopus Consulting Group Inc. and Orian Engineers Inc. will have to pay back wages to 21 workers, fork out $103,000 in fines and have been banned from hiring employees through the H1-B Visa program for one year.
These incidents of wage theft once again raise the question of whether the tech industry will take responsibility for the conduct of their contractors. In the past, when tech companies hired security officers, coders, secretaries and others through contractors, tech could claim “plausible deniability” when those contractors misbehaved. However, as more and more abuses come to light, it becomes harder and harder for tech companies to turn a blind eye toward their contract workers.
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