Apple Responds to Nightline Foxconn Report of the Day

Apple Responds to Nightline Foxconn Report of the Day: Apple has responded to the ABC Nightline report that went behind the scenes of controversial Chinese manufacturer Foxconn, one of the companies that assembles iPhones and iPads.

Surprisingly, Apple only took issue with one of the facts in the report. Foxconn worker Zhou Xiao Ying said that she removes the aluminum shavings from 6,000 iPad Apple logos every day, but Apple said that number is closer to 3,000.

6,000 Apple logos on iPads are “deburred” every day, but that’s done in two 8 hours shifts. Apple says Zhou likely meant that her station handles 6,000 logos a day, not that she personally meets that quota.

Foxconn had a correction of its own about ABC’s claim that its starting pay is too low to meet the Chinese standard for a payroll tax withdrawal, saying that over 75% of its employees are earning more than the salary cited in the Nightline report. However, they’re still only making $2.18 an hour, plus overtime.

The Fair Labor Association, the independent group Apple has brought in to audit working conditions at Foxconn, took issue with the suggestion that Apple had joined the group to deflect bad PR from recent New York Times reports about Foxconn.

“I, of course, cannot speak for Apple, but I do believe that the decision to join was probably taken some months before (and therefore well before) the New York Timesarticles,” said FLA president Auret van Heerden.

Watch the Nightline report after the jump.