Apple Sues OpenAI, Accusing It of Stealing Company Secrets (nytimes.com) 50
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.
[...] 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.
Just the tip of the berg (Score:2)
There's the mass of unlicensed scraping too. But that's another story.
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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
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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!
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^Walignment to protect us from rogue AIs?!
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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.
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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.
Re: Just the tip of the berg (Score:2)
No this is not possible (Score:5, Funny)
Re: No this is not possible (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: No this is not possible (Score:5, Interesting)
Sadly, that's more likely the individual people at Apple, rather than Apple per se. Same story at M$ and every other corporation. The internal fighting for higher pay means the individuals are stealing and backstabbing each other within.
Re: No this is not possible (Score:2)
This distinction might only exist in your head. Apple as a company either rewards this behaviour or it doesn't. The company's actions is the sum of the actions taken by individuals while representing the company.
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Promotion is reward. If promotion is possible then people will lie their way up.
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Re: No this is not possible (Score:3)
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Well, there's honest, and then there's not being mentally prepared to operate in the modern business arena. Even honest people consult lawyers. Naivete is not a virtue.
Re: No this is not possible (Score:2)
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You didn't have a nondisclosure agreement or anything?
Non-disclosure agreements are only as potent as the lawyers behind them, which in this case means that Apple's lawyers would completely overwhelm whatever piddly lawyers a bunch of poor startup founders could afford. That NDA wouldn't be worth the paper it's printed on or the flash it's stored in.
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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.
geez man, don't leave us hanging -- what was the idea?
are Tang Tan and Chang Liu careers over? (Score:2)
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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.
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Correct, it's promotion-worthy behavior. Law-breaking is the goal for companies like OpenAI.
source without paywall (Score:5, Informative)
https://www.reuters.com/legal/... [reuters.com]
OpenAI is run by Morons (Score:5, Interesting)
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.
Re: OpenAI is run by Morons (Score:1)
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."
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Apple is a corporation with expertise, Musk is the opposite. They are nothing alike and cannot be compared in this way or any other way.
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Apple mostly buys AI from others. They trained a few models (unremarkable but not bad for their time) but most of them aren't in use anymore and they talk about licensing Gemini.
I am surprised they noticed now (Score:2)
I mean, it was obvious this would happen. This is one of the companies that basically stole the whole Internet to build their product.
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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.
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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.
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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.
improperly? (Score:3)
'...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.
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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
How do job candidates ... (Score:2)
asked job candidates from Apple to share details about secret projects and to bring device components and prototypes to their interviews.
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.
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True. Because as current Apple employees, that NDA would be on file and still in effect. As a past Apple employee, it would behoove Apple to keep those people from walking out with new project prototypes. By the time the NDA lapses, the projects will on the market and no longer such a big secret (some stuff may still be proprietary).
I still don't think the DoD will let me walk off with the blueprints to their turbo-encabulator. Not for the rest of my life.
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Yeah, well, Apple also has a history of letting employees take prototypes out for "real world testing" and getting discovered. Just like with their devices, Apple's physical security is weak.
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Perhaps by design. There's nothing beter than a word of mouth campaign to promote a coming product.
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Absolutely. But there is at least 3 times I can think of that it definitely was not the case.
Pot... (Score:1)
No way. (Score:2)
A company that believes it owns all human knowledge since the beginning of time simply because that knowledge exists also believes it owns corporate knowledge simply because it exists, even if that knowledge is owned by another company? You don't say?
These companies don't play by any intellectual property rules. The corporate world has always believed that intellectual property is somehow inherently *their* intellectual property, and there is no argument or rationale that they will accept that states that a