Google Engineer Indicted For Allegedly Stealing AI Trade Secrets For China, Could Spend Decades In Prison If Convicted

An Alphabet Inc. GOOG GOOGL-owned Google engineer, Linwei Ding, also known as Leon Ding, has been indicted by a federal grand jury for allegedly stealing trade secrets related to the tech giant’s AI chip software and hardware.

What Happened: Ding is accused of stealing over 500 confidential files containing AI trade secrets from Google.

These files are said to include software designs for Google’s tensor processing unit (TPU) chips, hardware and software specifications for GPUs used in Google’s data center, and designs for Google’s machine learning workloads in data centers.

The indictment was made on March 5 and Ding was arrested on Wednesday in Newark, California, reported The Verge.

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The alleged theft took place between May 2022 and May 2023, during which Ding is said to have transferred the files to his personal Google Cloud account. He then reportedly converted the data from Apple Notes to PDFs to avoid detection by Google’s “data loss prevention systems.”

Ding is also accused of joining a Chinese machine learning company, Rongshu, as its CTO, and later founding and leading a machine learning startup named Zhisuan, all while still employed at Google.

If convicted, Ding faces up to ten years in prison and a $250,000 fine for each of the four counts of theft of trade secrets he has been charged with.

Why It Matters: The indictment of Ding comes at a time when the U.S. is actively working to curb China’s technological advancements. In October 2023, the U.S. imposed strict restrictions on the procurement of vital spare parts for chip equipment, as part of a broader effort to deter China’s technological strides in the semiconductor realm.

This incident also follows another shocking event involving a Google engineer. In January 2024, a Google software engineer was arrested for the murder of his wife, leaving the tech community in disbelief.

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Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of Benzinga Neuro and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.