Today’s top tech news: Indian companies battle biased visa rules, AMD hits a 13-year high and Honor launches three new smartphones in India

​H-1B visas: US immigration seems to like certain companies more than others

The increasing rate of H-1B visa rejections is only targeting certain IT service companies from India — like Capgemini, Deloitte, Cognizant, and Infosys among others. While companies based in the US — like Google, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft — are hardly facing rejection rates of 1%.

Why you should care:

The fact that H-1B rejection rates are only centered around Indian IT services doesn’t mean that skilled Indians aren’t going to the US. In fact, Indian account for most of the US visas that are being given out. According to Shivendra SIngh, the Vice President and Head of Global Trade Development and NASSCOM, Indian nationals cornering 70% of the US visas is a testimony to their skill set.

​AMD is nearing its best level in 13 years after Microsoft says it'll use its chips in the next Xbox

AMD’s stock price has crossed new thresholds, the highest in 13 years, after Microsoft announced that it will be using AMD chips to power the next Xbox — Project Scarlett.

Playstation is also on the bandwagon having previously announced that it will also be using AMD chips to power the next Playstation console.

It’s a big win for AMD since its shares, as of September 2015, were only at around $2 and now they have hit $33.95 — mere cents from the previous record of $34.14 in March 2006.

Why should you care:

If you were planning on buying a new gaming console, the choice between buying Microsoft’s Xbox or Sony’s Playstation just got harder. But the consoles will feature the new 7nm AMD chipset, ray tracing and have an SSD for storage. So, more than the technology — you should be looking at which games are available on which console before making a decision.

​Honor launches 20i, Honor 20 and Honor 20 Pro in India

Honor, for the first time, has launched three new smartphones simultaneously in the Indian market. Honor 20 Pro, priced at ₹39,999, is the most powerful of the three with 8GB RAM and 256GB storage. Honor 20i, on the other hand, is most toned down version of the three. It has 4GB RAM and 128GB of storage at the price of ₹14,999.

Honor 20 has most of the same specifications as the Honoro 20 Pro except of its battery and the quad camera setup. At ₹32,999, Honor 20 has 6GB RAM and 128GB of storage with only three cameras — two in the back and one up front.

Why you should care:

Honor is a Huawei sub-brand which means it will be subject to the same restrictions of US trade ban, including the suspension of business activities with Google. But since the phone was already launched in the other parts of the world before the ban came into place, these three devices will get Google updates and have the Google Play store.

​"Love Pakistan", a group of Turks hack Amitabh Bachchan's Twitter account

Bollywood’s veteren actor, Amitabh Bachchan was hacked late last night. His twitter was taken over by unauthorised entities that changed his profile picture to a picture of the Pakistani Prime Minister, Imran Khan. His Twitter bio was also altered to read, “Love Pakistan”.

Why you should care:

Online security is important for everyone, from the layman to celebrities. The hack on Amitabh Bachchan may have caught the public eye due to his stature in Bollywood but this could just as easily have happened to somebody who isn’t famous. Be sure to change your password often and regularly update your security settings on social networking sites.