Ex-Apple Employee Stole Secrets for Chinese Firm, U.S. Says
Ex-Apple Employee Stole Secrets for Chinese Firm, U.S.
Says
Engineer was arrested as he was about to board flight to
China
Prosecutors say he admitted downloading files to wife’s
laptop
By Joel Rosenblatt
and Mark Gurman July 10, 2018, 12:19 PM PDT
A former Apple Inc. engineer was arrested on charges of
stealing driverless car secrets for a Chinese startup after he passed through
the security checkpoint at San Jose International Airport to board a flight to
China.
Xiaolang Zhang was accused by U.S. prosecutors of
downloading files containing proprietary information as he prepared to leave
the iPhone maker in April and start work for Guangzhou-based Xiaopeng Motors.
according to a criminal complaint filed Monday in federal court in San Jose,
California.
A hardware engineer for Apple’s autonomous vehicle
development team, Zhang was granted access to confidential company databases,
according to the complaint. After he took paternity leave he told Apple in
April he was moving back to China to work at Xmotors. Apple grew more
suspicious after seeing his increased network activity and visits to the office
before he resigned, according to the complaint.
Zhang admitted to the Federal Bureau of Investigation
that he downloaded Apple driverless technology files to his wife’s laptop to
have continued access to them, according to the complaint. He was arrested July
7.
The charges against Zhang echo civil claims that Waymo,
Alphabet Inc.’s driverless unit, leveled against Uber Technologies Inc. and
engineer Anthony Levandowski. While the lawsuit settled, a criminal
investigation of Levandowski’s alleged trade secret theft from Google remains
unresolved.
The U.S. Treasury Department plans to heighten scrutiny
of Chinese investments in sensitive U.S. industries under an emergency law. The
crackdown is aimed at China’s investment in new-energy vehicles, robotics and
aerospace, interests the Trump administration has viewed as a threat to
economic and national security, according to people familiar with the plans.
Apple’s self-driving car project is a rare initiative by
the company that has played out in the public eye over the past few years. In
2015, Apple executives approved a plan to build a self-driving, electric
vehicle to take on Tesla Inc. and the Detroit auto industry. Apple hired more
than 1,000 engineers.
However, about two years ago, Apple scaled back its plans
to build a physical vehicle and has since had a team working on the underlying
self-driving software and sensor technology. The self-driving space is
exceptionally competitive, with dozens of companies across the world trying to
take the lead in the burgeoning field.
Apple has dozens of cars equipped with its software on
the road today, but it’s still unclear how Apple’s reliability stacks up
against other industry titans like Uber Technologies Inc. and Google’s Waymo
division. Apple plans to use its robocar technology on special Volkswagen vans
to transport employees between offices. Apple hasn’t said how or if it will
eventually release its technology to consumers.
About 5,000 of Apple’s more than 135,000 full-time
employees are disclosed on the car project. Out of those, roughly 2,700 workers
have access to one or more Apple databases containing information about the
project, according to the complaint.
The majority of Zhang’s network activity “consisted of
both bulk searches and targeted downloading copious pages of information from
the various confidential database applications,” according to the complaint.
Prosecutors accuse him of downloading engineering schematics, and technical
manuals and reports.
“Apple takes confidentiality and the protection of our
intellectual property very seriously,” company spokesman Tom Neumayr said in an
email. “We’re working with authorities on this matter and will do everything
possible to make sure this individual and any other individuals involved are
held accountable for their actions.”
Tamara Crepet, a federal public defender who is initially
representing Zhang, didn’t immediately respond to a phone call seeking comment.
The case is U.S.A. v. Zhang, 18-cr-70919, U.S. District
Court, Northern District of California (San Jose).
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