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The U.S. is awash with scam text messages. Officials say it has become a billion-dollar, highly sophisticated business benefiting criminals in China. Your highway toll payment is now past due, one text warns. You have U.S. Postal Service fees to pay, another threatens. You owe the New York City Department of Finance for unpaid traffic violations. The texts are ploys to get unsuspecting victims to fork over their credit-card details. The gangs behind the scams take advantage of this information to buy iPhones, gift cards, clothing and cosmetics. Criminal organizations operating out of China, which investigators blame for the toll...

Google CEO Sundar Pichai on Tuesday announced that he briefed Prime Minister Narendra Modi on plans to establish a first-ever mega Artificial Intelligence (AI) hub in Visakhapatnam, calling the project a "landmark development". This project, worth approximately USD 15 billion over five years (2026-2030), is Google’s largest investment in India to date, according to a company statement.

“Indians are just waking up after Trump nuked the H1B program. Want to keep them in India? Clog the flight reservation system!” “Operation Clog the toilet needs your help. 4chan hatched a diabolical plan to clog up flight schedules to keep the Poopjeets in India or pay a $100,000 fee to come back.” “Ben up all night participating in Operation Clog the Toilet. Preventing jeets from getting back in 24 hours so they are forced to pay $100k to renew H1B” These are some comments posted on 4chan — an anonymous imageboard known for controversial content because some boards lack...

Confusion and fear gripped H-1B visa holders over the weekend as a sudden US policy change forced some to choose between family commitments abroad and their careers in the United States. President Donald Trump’s announcement of a USD 100,000 fee on H-1B visa applications, part of a broader immigration crackdown, sent shockwaves through the tech and finance sectors, prompting workers from India and China to abandon travel plans and rush back to the US. At San Francisco airport, an engineer whose wife was scheduled to fly to Dubai described the impossible decision he faced. “It is a situation where we...

At a time when most people use keyboards to write, does handwriting really matter? Yes, say Indian courts, if the writer is a doctor. Jokes around the notoriously bad handwriting of many doctors that can only be deciphered by pharmacists are common in India, as around the world. But the latest order emphasising the importance of clear handwriting came recently from the Punjab and Haryana High Court which said that "legible medical prescription is a fundamental right" as it can make a difference between life and death. The court order came in a case that had nothing to do with...

After US President Donald Trump and Congress failed to reach a funding deal by Wednesday's deadline, the government shutdown began. As a result, hundreds of thousands of federal employees face furloughs, and many offices will be closed. H-1B visas will also face a pause until the shutdown ends, says immigration attorney Nicole Gunara. She said that H-1B visa filings will not be processed until the Congress can agree on federal funding allocations.

Apoorva arrived in New York in 2018 on an H-1B visa, fresh from one of India’s top graduate schools and brimming with hope of building a life in the United States. She soon joined an architecture firm, eager to contribute her skills and establish roots. But her dreams were quickly dashed — because Apoorva, like many other immigrants on an H-1B, soon experienced some visa-related issues. She recalled being stuck at her minimum wage architecture job for over three years. Changing jobs on an H-1B visa is famously difficult, and often means enduring months of bureaucratic limbo and steep United...

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Ranking Member Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) are reintroducing bipartisan legislation to reform and close loopholes in the H-1B and L-1 visa programs. The H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act targets fraud and abuse in our immigration system, provides protections for American workers and visa holders and enhances transparency in the foreign worker recruitment process. Grassley and Durbin have long partnered to improve the H-1B visa system and first introduced their bipartisan legislation in 2007. Last week, the senators sent letters to 10 major U.S. employers, including Amazon, Google and Meta, scrutinizing their heavy...

Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) today introduced the Visa Cap Enforcement Act. This bill restricts the ability of universities, research institutions, and non-profits to hire an unlimited number of foreign workers. “Colleges and universities shouldn’t get special treatment for bringing in woke and anti-American professors from around the world. My bill closes these loopholes that universities have abused for far too long,” said Senator Cotton. Text of the bill can be found here. The Visa Cap Enforcement Act would: Eliminate four exemptions to the H-1B visa cap, including one for foreigners who hold a master’s degree or higher from a U.S....

United States lawmakers continued tightening rules for the H-1B and L-1 worker visa programmes Monday after three senators introduced two separate pieces of legislation to target "loopholes" used by for- and non-profit employers. The top Republican and Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee - Chuck Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, and Democrat Dick Durbin of Illinois - tabled a bill to raise wage and hiring standards, mandate public job postings, and narrowing visa eligibility, among others. "Congress created the H-1B and L-1 visa programs as limited pathways for businesses to acquire top talent when it can't be found at home....

Florida politician Anthony Sabatini has sparked debate over the H-1B visa row, tweeting a call for “a complete and total shutdown.” The move comes in the wake of President Donald Trump’s surprise announcement of a $100,000 fee on new H-1B applications, aimed at curbing alleged abuses of the program. Far-right politician Sabatini on Monday tweeted, “I am calling for a complete and total shutdown of H-1 B visas until we can find out what is going on.” His tweet went viral in no time, given the ongoing debate surrounding the H-1B visa and its impact on the American workforce and...

Florida politician Anthony Sabatini has called for a complete halt to the H-1B visa program, saying the government needs to review how it operates. In a tweet on Monday, he wrote, “I am calling for a complete and total shut down of h-1b visas until we can find out what is going on.” Sabatini framed the move as a defence of American workers, amid growing concern among some conservatives that the program displaces US employees and affects wages. The H-1B visa program, which allows US companies to hire skilled foreign workers, currently includes an estimated 600,000–700,000 visa holders, with a...

-snip- Many H-1B visas are awarded to foreign graduates of U.S. universities. Visa holders can generally stay in the country for up to three years, with an additional three-year extension, and H-1Bs have the additional benefit of being able to be converted into a green card. That’s a common path foreign professionals use to establish permanent citizenship, Glennon said. How does Trump want to change the H-1B program? During the COVID-19 pandemic and near the end of his first term, Trump suspended the H-1B visa program, saying he wanted Americans to be able to find jobs in a fragile labor...

Days after the Trump administration's big H-1B fee hike to $100,000, a bipartisan support to further changes to the visa allocation system was seen in the US senate with the introduction of the H-1B, L-1 visa reforms bill. The bill proposes further restrictions on both visas, and comes days after the steep H-1B fee hike and overhaul proposed for the existing lottery system. The move is likely to affect Indians the most, who account for 71% of H-1B visa beneficiaries. The proposed legislation introduces stricter wage and recruitment rules for employers, giving priority to H-1B visas for workers with STEM...

The Trump administration has launched Project Firewall, a major initiative to curb H-1B visa misuse and prioritise American workers for high-paying, skilled jobs. This move signals a shift toward stricter enforcement and could reshape opportunities for both domestic and foreign professionals. The move comes amid rising concerns over the exploitation of the H-1B programme. According to a January 2025 report by fwd.us, the US hosts roughly 730,000 H-1B visa holders along with 550,000 dependents. Critics have long argued that some companies use the program to hire cheaper foreign talent, often at the expense of qualified American professionals. This initiative follows...

When Pratham Jain graduated in May with a Master’s in Business and Science from a reputable US university, job-hunting wasn’t the main hurdle.“In the beginning, my focus was on classes, internships and making the most of the campus life. But as graduation got closer,” he says, “the visa conversation started to overshadow everything.” -snip- “Every international student I know keeps one eye on their grades and the other on Washington, because even a small policy change can completely reshape your career path,” Jain says. “It’s almost like earning a second degree here, one in navigating immigration paperwork, deadlines, and constantly...

Companies could face probes into their compliance with the H-1B visa program as part of the Trump Administration’s effort to clamp down on the program and force companies to hire more Americans. The Department of Labor announced on Friday that it was launching Project Firewall, an “enforcement initiative” that will investigate employers for potential abuse of the H-1B visa process. The initiative may be the first time the federal government has sought to broadly enforce H-1B legal standards intended to protect both the H-1B employee and American workers, such as paying wages on par with other workers of similar qualifications...

Two of the US Senate’s most senior lawmakers are once again teaming up to overhaul America’s high-skilled H-1B and L-1 visa systems, saying companies have turned what was meant to be a tool for innovation into a loophole for outsourcing. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley and Ranking Member Dick Durbin reintroduced the H-1B and L-1 Visa Reform Act. This latest push comes just weeks after US President Donald Trump signed a sweeping presidential proclamation on H-1B visa applications. Under the new order, companies are now required to pay a one-time fee of $100,000 (around Rs 88 lakh) on every...

Thousands of young Indians have mapped their adult lives with the aim of moving to the US, plans that now lie in tatters. Meghna Gupta* had planned it all – a master’s degree by 23, a few years of working in India, and then a move to the United States before she turned 30 to eventually settle there. So, she clocked countless hours at the Hyderabad office of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), India’s largest IT firm and a driver of the country’s emergence as the global outsourcing powerhouse in the sector. She waited to get to the promotion that would...

Several Indian students who secured job offers in the United States have seen their offers withdrawn after US President Donald Trump announced the $1,00,000 H-1B visa policy. Under the new rule, US employers who are looking to sponsor H-1B visas should pay a one-time fee of $1,00,000, which many companies now cite as a reason to back out. Thousands of students, who are currently on F-1 visas, wanted to bag a job in the United States and obtain an H-1B visa. But with the new rules and skyhigh price on the visa, the companies are reluctant to pay the amount,...