Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
The Courts Apple Hardware

Apple Sues OpenAI, Accusing It of Stealing Company Secrets (nytimes.com) 40

Posted by BeauHD from the hardware-wars dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Apple on Friday accused OpenAI of stealing secrets about products still in development, setting up a legal face-off between two of the world's biggest tech companies. In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, the consumer tech giant said that OpenAI, a leader in artificial intelligence that has a new hardware business, had asked job candidates from Apple to share details about secret projects and to bring device components and prototypes to their interviews. Apple also accused an OpenAI employee of downloading internal documents from a laptop owned by the iPhone maker. OpenAI used the confidential information to approach Apple's manufacturing partners, including asking one partner to demonstrate Apple's technique for finishing metal on its devices, the lawsuit says. Apple sent a letter to OpenAI in February to raise concerns that confidential information could be "making its way to OpenAI's business improperly," according to the suit. OpenAI did not respond, Apple said. "OpenAI's nascent hardware business now rests on the shakiest of foundations, rotten to its core by its illegal reliance on misappropriated trade secrets," Apple wrote in its lawsuit.

[...] In its lawsuit Friday, Apple accused Tang Tan, OpenAI's chief hardware officer and a former Apple executive, of coaching his hires from Apple on how to evade Apple's security processes for departing employees. Apple accused another former employee, Chang Liu, of using a former colleague's Apple-owned laptop to access and download technical documents while working at OpenAI. Mr. Liu told that Apple employee what information about unannounced products she should study before job interviews, Apple said. Mr. Liu also planned to access internal documents through an Apple-owned laptop that he didn't return when he left the company, according to the lawsuit. OpenAI had misled the manufacturing company it approached to learn about the metal finishing technique to believe it had Apple's permission to view it, according to the lawsuit. Apple is seeking an injunction that would prevent OpenAI from possessing, using or sharing Apple's trade secrets, as well as an order requiring OpenAI to return Apple's intellectual property.

Apple Sues OpenAI, Accusing It of Stealing Company Secrets More | Reply

Apple Sues OpenAI, Accusing It of Stealing Company Secrets

Comments Filter:

  • There's the mass of unlicensed scraping too. But that's another story.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by SumDog ( 466607 )
      But it's been lossy compressed into a big parameter store and you can't reproduce it exactly, so it's not the same ... also that means JPEGs a 50% compression and DVD encodes of BluRays should be totally legal for anyone to sell.

      There are several copyright cases going through the courts right now. I have little doubt one will eventually request certiorari from SCOTUS. High courts in Europe might rule differently. The hypocrisy of all these companies is deafening. I hope someone just leaks GPT-5.x and/or

      • I hope someone just leaks GPT-5.x and/or Fable-5 at some point.

        You monster! Won't anyone think of the stockh^H^H^H^H^Hchildren!

      • also that means JPEGs a 50% compression and DVD encodes of BluRays should be totally legal for anyone to sell.

        I know you're trying to point out contradictions in the law, but...

        You're going to have a hard time convincing a judge or jury that the law should be interpreted this way.

      • But it's been lossy compressed into a big parameter store and you can't reproduce it exactly, so it's not the same ... also that means JPEGs a 50% compression and DVD encodes of BluRays should be totally legal for anyone to sell.

        I think the distinction is in the human interpretable output, not how the data is stored. You can compress the crap out of a Harry Potter film and watch it as a blurry distorted mess, but it's still the same film. However, if you asked ChatGPT to output the same story, I wouldn't be surprised if it hallucinates halfway through how Harry Potter is also a prolific drug kingpin, in addition to being a boy wizard.

  • No this is not possible (Score:5, Funny)

    by phantomfive ( 622387 ) on Saturday July 11, 2026 @12:28AM (#66232368) Journal
    Sam Altman is a fine, upstanding young man with not a hint of deception in his bones. He would never lie, cheat, steal, infringe copyright, engage in corporate espionage, abuse his sister, lie to the board, or anything remotely unethical. When Aaron Schwartz said that Sam Altman couldn't be trusted, of course he was being sarcastic.

    • Re: No this is not possible (Score:4, Interesting)

      by xgerrit ( 2879313 ) on Saturday July 11, 2026 @01:12AM (#66232392)
      I worked for a startup that was building a fitness app, and Apple asked our marketing team to pitch ideas for an Earth Day promotion to promote us in the App Store. Our team had a pretty unique idea that we all were excited about, but after the pitch our Apple contact stopped answering messages about the promo. Sure enough, 3 months later Apple took the exact idea and used it in a promo for one of their own products on the App Store. At the time I thought this was some weird one-off thing that happened, but it turns out it wasn't.. it's exactly how they operate [wsj.com]. Make no mistake, OpenAI is no saint, but Apple is a ruthless mega-corporation that's been stealing ideas for years. There's no one to root for in this one.
  • Reading this it looks like they violated multiple laws.

    • Careers over? Not at all. It merits a promotion for derring-do, or something like that. Unless Apple wins the lawsuit and costs OpenAI too much money, in which case they'll be flushed down the toilet.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dfghjk ( 711126 )

        Correct, it's promotion-worthy behavior. Law-breaking is the goal for companies like OpenAI.

  • OpenAI is run by Morons (Score:3)

    by locater16 ( 2326718 ) on Saturday July 11, 2026 @02:24AM (#66232416)
    Morons with a capital M. As I've heard it direct from big tech company employees there are perfectly established ways to skirt trade secret laws, you sit there and ask the employees in question "how we might go about accomplishing" X thing that their previous employer did, and in a roundabout way they tell you what direction to take, and pretty soon your to the same place and that's it, you're free and clear. On the other hand directly asking "share secret project", "bring prototypes", and such directly seems to contradict all established trade secret law I know about.

    Which is to say: Apple seems to have a fantastically clear and straightforward case and are 100% going to win an enormous settlement. OpenAI has to be the company with highest liabilities, maybe in all of history. Like holy fuck are they in the deepest hole I've seen since The South Seas Trading Company, the world first stock scam that was so big it almost bankrupted England. I can't wait for the podcasts and books and movie(s?, probably) all about the collapse. It'll be so much fun.

    • Gemini:

      "The unwinding worked so well that it cemented the power of the British Treasury and the Bank of England for the next two centuries, creating the bedrock of modern public financeâ"even if it meant letting the most corrupt architects of the crisis walk away clean."

  • I mean, it was obvious this would happen. This is one of the companies that basically stole the whole Internet to build their product.

    • It probably is rather difficult to notice and even if they do, they need to do something about it. Apple is paranoid and without a doubt has a lot of exfiltration detection on their systems, but there are always ways around if there is determination and intelligence. Clearly, they did eventually notice (otherwise no lawsuit). It would be interesting to know how long between the act and the detection - obviously it takes time to prepare so the filing of the lawsuit isn't the relavent date.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by gweihir ( 88907 )

        Yes. It would also be interesting to know what they actually detected. If it was the usual "employee copies company secrets into prompt", I wonder whether that even qualifies. Maybe if they had special agreements in place.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by dfghjk ( 711126 )

          I think what's even more interesting is how this underscores what a fraud Jony Ive is. While Ive nurtured a reputation of being the genius behind Apple's design for an entire career AND transformed that into a relationship with OpenAI to develop consumer goods of similar status, to learn anything about how Apple "does it" they have to steal trade secrets. Is it that OpenAI simply doesn't know to ask the "genius" himself or is Ive just a fraud, just like Steve Jobs who inspired him?

  • accusing another data collector of data collecting

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by PPH ( 736903 )

      In the grand scheme of things, is Apple really that eggregious of a data collector. They seem to be happy securing their customers' information. Even from themselves.

      As long as they get their 30% of the revenue.

  • '...confidential information could be "making its way to OpenAI's business improperly," ...'

    "Improperly" is a matter of perspective. For a company like OpenAI, everything is done through theft of other people's work. From their perspective it's entirely "proper". OpenAI needs to be exterminated. Musk first, though.

  • Rare is the day Apple trots out the legal team. I wonder if this is all those Google billions coming home to roost? Smells like a proxy war Apple is fighting for Google. Apple hasn't even fielded a competitor and is dead last in the big AI horse race - they couldn't give a *hit about OpenAI playing with hardware. We have to ask how Apple knows so much about what went on in confidential job interviews? How is it Apple knows lines were crossed - did they cross some this selves? Sounds sus that Apple would hav
    • From TFA:

      Apple alleged that Liu failed to return a company-issued work laptop and later used an authentication bug to access Apple's internal network, downloading "dozens of Apple's confidential hardware-related files."

      The iPhone maker also claimed that OpenAI’s hardware chief Tan had been "methodically using Apple’s confidential information to benefit OpenAI" before his departure by emailing himself information about Apple suppliers and internal industry summaries. Tan worked on the iPhone for most of his 24-year tenure at Apple, according to his LinkedIn page.

      Apple alleged that Tan encouraged Apple employees to bring parts from Apple to job interviews at OpenAI for “show and tell” sessions, citing an incident in its filing where one OpenAI job candidate allegedly said that he “didn’t even know we could take those from the office.”

      Seems Apple has what they may need from their own systems. Given Apple's penchant for secrecy, they should have known Apple could see what tehy did and use it against them and OpenAI. I would also not be surprised if some employees who interviewed but didn't leave Apple told the approbate people was OpenAI was asking or in interviews.

      What I don't get if you're a long term Apple employee at a relatively senior level, why risk everything you've made in stock alone by doing something that risks los

  • Eh (Score:2)

    by Bahbus ( 1180627 )

    asked job candidates from Apple to share details about secret projects and to bring device components and prototypes to their interviews

    Components and prototypes really shouldn't be let out and about to begin with.

    Apple also accused an OpenAI employee of downloading internal documents from a laptop owned by the iPhone maker.

    Someone was in charge of this laptop. How did the OpenAI employee get a hold of it?

    manufacturing company it approached to learn about the metal finishing technique to believe it had Apple's permission to view it

    This is a failure on the manufacturing company and Apple's for not establishing clear channels on how it gives permissions for something like this.

    These all seem like more of Apple's own personal problems. I mean OpenAI is scummy and all, but this is too easy.

  • asked job candidates from Apple to share details about secret projects and to bring device components and prototypes to their interviews.

    ... get hold of this Apple IP before signing an NDA?

    When I was interviewing for a DoD job, I don't think they would have loaned me a W88 warhead to show my other prospective employers.

  • Kettle, black.

Slashdot Top Deals

Marvelous! The super-user's going to boot me! What a finely tuned response to the situation!

Close