A buyer tries on the Apple Imaginative and prescient Professional headset in the course of the product launch on the Apple Retailer in New York Metropolis on February 2, 2024.
Angela Weiss | AFP | Getty Photographs
Apple has accused a former engineer for its Imaginative and prescient Professional headset pc of stealing firm commerce secrets and techniques earlier than beginning a brand new job at Snap, in accordance with a lawsuit filed in California final week.
Within the June 24 court docket submitting, Apple accuses Di Liu, a senior design engineer, of downloading 1000’s of paperwork in his remaining days on the Cupertino firm final 12 months and saving them to his private cloud accounts.
This lawsuit is the digital money instance of Apple publicly going after a former worker for leaking inside info. Apple is an intensely secretive firm, and lawsuits like this one spotlight how the iPhone maker workout routines tight management over its inside info, even when it has to pursue authorized motion in opposition to former workers.
Apple alleges that Liu did not inform the corporate when he resigned late final 12 months that he was headed to Snap, a competitor and maker of sensible glasses. In consequence, Apple didn’t shut off his entry to accounts and allowed him a customary two-week transition interval, which he used to obtain firm information, in accordance with the lawsuit.
“Worse nonetheless, the evaluate of Mr. Liu’s Apple-issued work laptop computer additionally exhibits that whereas sustaining entry to Apple’s Proprietary Info beneath false pretenses, he used his Apple credentials to exfiltrate 1000’s of paperwork containing Proprietary Info from Apple’s safe file storage programs,” the iPhone maker’s attorneys stated within the submitting.
Lots of the information downloaded by Liu had codenames for Apple initiatives and described the corporate’s expertise, product design and provide chain, in accordance with the lawsuit. Apple says that each one workers comply with hold Apple information confidential and that Liu broke confidentiality agreements he made when he joined. Liu labored for Apple between 2017 and 2024, in accordance with the lawsuit.
Liu labored on Apple’s Imaginative and prescient Professional headset as a system product design engineer, per the submitting. Liu didn’t reply to a request for remark from CNBC.
Julia Boorstin tries Snap’s Spectacles AR glasses
Andrew Evers
Apple attorneys wrote that Liu might use the commerce secrets and techniques in his work at Snap. Apple shouldn’t be suing Snap, and the social media firm didn’t reply to a request for remark.
“The overlap between Apple’s Proprietary Info that Mr. Liu retained and Snap’s AR merchandise (for which Mr. Liu is a ‘product design engineer’) means that Mr. Liu intends to make use of Apple’s Proprietary Info at Snap,” in accordance with the submitting.
Apple is searching for damages and for Liu to have his units inspected by a forensic examiner to verify all of the commerce secrets and techniques are deleted.
The iPhone maker has sued a number of former workers in recent times for taking information once they left the corporate.
Apple settled with former engineer Simon Lancaster in 2022 over offering info to a journalist. Apple additionally sued a former worker, Andrew Aude, in 2024 over leaking particulars to the media. That lawsuit was dismissed after Aude apologized.
The Cupertino firm sued Rivos, a chip startup staffed by former Apple semiconductor workers, over its mental property, and settled in 2024.
Moreover no less than three former Apple workers have additionally been arrested and accused by the government of taking firm secrets and techniques and giving them to China-linked organizations. One pled guilty and was sentenced to 4 months in jail, and two are nonetheless in proceedings.
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