A Chinese software engineer was arrested in California on Wednesday for stealing Google’s AI technology.
California:
U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Wednesday that a Chinese software engineer who secretly worked for two Chinese companies was arrested on suspicion of stealing artificial intelligence technology from Google.
Garland said in a statement that Lingwei Ding, 38, also known as Leung Ding, is charged with four counts of theft of trade secrets.
Mr. Ding, who was arrested in Newark, California, on Wednesday, allegedly transferred sensitive information from Google’s network to his personal accounts while secretly partnering with a China-based company in the AI industry.
“The Department of Justice will not tolerate the theft of artificial intelligence or other advanced technologies that could jeopardize national security,” Garland said.
“We will strictly protect sensitive technology developed in the United States from falling into the hands of people who should not have it,” he said.
Ding’s arrest shows “the lengths to which affiliates of companies based in the People’s Republic of China are willing to steal American innovation,” FBI Director Christopher Wray said, referring to China by its official name. Stated.
He added: “The theft of innovative technology and trade secrets from American companies could result in job losses and devastating economic and national security impacts.”
According to the indictment, Ding was hired by Google in 2019 to develop software installed in Google’s supercomputing data centers.
He is suspected of having begun uploading confidential Google information to his personal cloud account between May 2022 and May 2023.
The stolen files were related to the hardware infrastructure and software platform that enables Google’s supercomputing data centers to train large-scale AI models through machine learning.
According to the indictment, in June 2022, Ding was approached by the CEO of Beijing Rongshui Lianzhi Technology Co., Ltd. (Rongshui), an early-stage Chinese technology company, and was offered a maximum monthly salary of $14,800. He was offered the position of technical director.
Shortly before May 2023, Ding founded his own China-based company, Shanghai Zhiguan Technology Co., Ltd. (Zhiguan), and became CEO, the paper said.
According to the indictment, Ding never informed Google of his relationship with Rongxiu or Zhisu.
After Ding resigned from Google in December 2023, the Mountain View, California-based company searched his network activity history and discovered fraudulent uploads from May 2022 to May 2023.
“After our investigation, we determined that this employee had stolen numerous documents, and we immediately referred the incident to law enforcement,” Google spokesperson Jose Castaneda said in a statement.
“We have stringent safeguards in place to prevent the theft of confidential commercial information and trade secrets,” Castaneda said. “We are grateful to the FBI for helping us protect our information, and we will continue to work closely with them.”
If convicted, Ding could face up to 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000 for each count.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
