The report was somewhat ambiguous about exactly how much N.Y.U. knew about the exemptions.

The report said that N.Y.U. did not know about the practice of granting exemptions, but it also said that “accounts vary” as to the extent of each party’s knowledge. Some N.Y.U. personnel interviewed said they were aware of a “time threshold,” the report said, but not the monetary threshold.

John Sexton, president of N.Y.U., said on Thursday that neither the university nor its Abu Dhabi government partner was aware of the exemption policy “or how widely it was being applied.”

The Nardello report took issue with some details in the Times article, specifically the genesis of a strike that led to the deportation of some workers. The report said the strike was related mostly to conditions at other projects in the area, where many hotels, businesses and cultural institutions have been expanding, in some cases, like N.Y.U.’s, with the financial backing of the oil-rich emirate.

But the report corroborated many of the article’s key findings. Among them was that hardly any of the workers had been reimbursed for fees, generally $1,000 to $3,000, that the workers had paid to recruitment agents in their home countries. The report estimated that more than 25,000 workers would have qualified for the reimbursement.

Only 20 workers were reimbursed, partly because the N.Y.U. policy requiring reimbursement was interpreted to apply only to workers hired specifically to work at the N.Y.U. campus. But most workers were employed by contractors working on several projects, and so were not limited to working on the N.Y.U. job.

The report cited evidence that N.Y.U., after promising in 2011 that it would reimburse recruitment fees even for workers who started on other projects, later narrowed the reimbursement to those “specifically recruited to our job site.” In addition, only those who could supply proof of having paid recruitment fees would receive reimbursement.

Daniel Nardello, chief executive of Nardello & Company, said such proof was virtually impossible because the recruiting agents are often dubious characters. “It would be like getting a receipt from a loan shark,” he said.