This is why the easy equation—layoffs on one side, visa paperwork on the other, therefore direct replacement—needs evidence at the job level. A company’s defence can be incomplete without the accusation becoming automatically proven, and a company can pay well on average while still having recruitment practices that deserve investigation. Asking for the records is more damaging to a weak defence than shouting at an engineer.
India’s concentration is real; the fraud percentage is a different question
The USCIS FY2024 report reports 399,395 approved H-1B petitions, including 283,397 for India-born beneficiaries and 3,052 for Pakistan-born beneficiaries. India accounted for 71.0% and China for 11.7%. This is a pronounced concentration, and it explains why changes to this channel attract such intense Indian attention; it does not establish that 71% of applicants committed fraud.
| Country of birth | FY2024 approved petitions | Share |
|---|---|---|
| India | 283,397 | 71.0% |
| China | 46,680 | 11.7% |
| Philippines | 5,248 | 1.3% |
| Canada | 4,222 | 1.1% |
| South Korea | 3,983 | 1.0% |
| Mexico | 3,333 | Less than 1% |
| Taiwan | 3,099 | Less than 1% |
| Pakistan | 3,052 | Less than 1% |
Note: These are approved petitions classified by country of birth, including continuing employment; they are not a count of first-time arrivals, green cards, or fraudulent cases. India’s count is approximately 92.9 times Pakistan’s, calculated from the same table.
The attempt to turn a small Pakistani share into proof of intellectual inferiority is especially dishonest. A market channel reflects established employer networks, company scale, legal sponsorship capacity and accumulated access alongside individual ability. It is entirely possible to acknowledge India’s larger footprint while rejecting the fantasy that every Pakistani outside that footprint is incapable of technical work.
The same precision strengthens the credential story. Financial Express reported on 7 June 2026 allegations involving at least 28 universities, nearly 100,000 forged academic documents, more than 36,000 alleged fake degrees at one institution, and purported links to some H-1B applications. Its account attributes the information to Insider Wire citing investigators. These are serious reported allegations, but the article itself separates a circulating “nearly 90%” fraud claim from the current investigation. Turning an old remark or an AI-generated percentage into today’s national fraud rate weakens an otherwise legitimate demand for credential verification.
There is documented history behind corporate scrutiny
This debate did not begin with a reply section. In 2013, Infosys agreed to a $34 million civil settlement over allegations involving visa and immigration-process abuse; the US Justice Department’s account described alleged use of B-1 holders for work that should have required appropriate work authorisation. The specific mechanism matters: it is historical evidence of an employer-level enforcement case, not proof that every contemporary Infosys employee—or every Indian graduate—is fraudulent.
Nor is the issue confined to Indian outsourcing firms. The Justice Department announced a $25 million agreement with Apple in 2023 resolving citizenship-status discrimination allegations concerning PERM recruitment. Its settlements record also describes Facebook’s 2021 case, including a $4.75 million civil penalty and up to $9.5 million for eligible victims. The broken incentive, where established, belongs to the recruitment process and the corporation benefiting from it.
