USCIS Announces Rules to Combat H-1B Visa Fraud & New Policies for Computer-Related H-1B Occupations

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has announced that it will begin taking a “more targeted approach” in site visits to the workplaces of U.S. companies sponsoring H-1B visa employees.  The measures described in the USCIS announcement include focusing on-site visits on H-1B-dependent companies, employers that cannot be validated with commercially available data, as well as employers petitioning for H-1B workers who work off-site at another company or organization's location (i.e. outsourcing companies, who typically petition for workers of other organizations).  These site visits will allow USCIS "to focus resources where fraud and abuse of the H-1B program may be more likely to occur, and determine whether H-1B dependent employers are evading their obligation to make a good faith effort to recruit U.S. workers." These random and unannounced visits will continue nationwide, except there will now be a clearer focus on making sure the employer is legitimate. 

The announcement also encourages people to report suspected fraud of abuse in the H-1B program, and provides a new hotline phone number and email address for people to report such things as wage disparities between H-1B workers and other workers performing the same or similar duties, and H-1B workers not performing duties specified in the H-1B petition.

These new initiatives follow USCIS’ recent policy memorandum narrowing the H-1B visa eligibility for certain computer-related occupations.  U.S. employers who filed H-1B petitions for employees in programming occupations described in the memo may receive a requests from USCIS to submit additional evidence showing that the position is complex or specialized and requires a professional degree.