IPhone Manufacturer Admits to Underage Interns

Some as young as 14 putting phones together

Although most of the hype and media attention regarding Apple's iPhone 5 focused on its design and usability, the human cost of actually making the phone has come to light. The company that manufactures the handset, Taiwan-based Foxconn, the world's largest maker of electronic components, has come under scrutiny again as it admitted to employing interns as young as 14 years old to piece together the iPhone 5.

Following a report from the independent not-for-profit organization China Labor Watch, in which the organization concluded underage interns were mainly sent to Foxconn by schools but that Foxconn did not check the IDs of the underage interns, Foxconn issued its own statement in an email to the technology news site Cnet, admitting it had employed interns under China's legal working age of 16. While China Labor Watch stated these schools held the primary responsibility for the incident, Foxconn was culpable for not confirming the ages of the workers.