A former Google software program engineer has been charged by a US court docket for stealing commerce secrets and techniques about synthetic intelligence (AI) expertise and whereas he was secretly main two Chinese language firms in numerous capacities.
Linwei Ding, aka Leon Ding, allegedly stole commerce secrets and techniques round Google’s AI chip software program and {hardware}. Ding is accused of stealing “from Google over 500 confidential recordsdata containing AI commerce secrets and techniques whereas covertly working for China-based firms looking for an edge within the AI expertise race.”
What knowledge was stolen
In response to the indictment, Ding stole knowledge associated to Google’s tensor processing unit (TPU) chips that powers the corporate’s AI workloads, and work along side Nvidia GPUs to coach in addition to run AI fashions like Gemini.The corporate additionally presents entry to the chips by accomplice platforms like Hugging Face.
Ding, who joined Google as a software program engineer in 2019, was tasked to develop software program utilized in Google’s supercomputing knowledge centres.
“As a result of Ding’s job obligations, he was authorised to entry Google Confidential Info associated to {hardware} infrastructure, the software program platform, and the AI fashions and purposes they supported,” the indictment mentioned.
Google labored as CTO and CEO at similar time
Aside from working for Google, he held two C-suite roles at two totally different firms in China. The indictment mentioned that he spent a number of months in China working for a start-up tech firm that provided him $14,800 monthly to be the corporate’s Chief Expertise Officer (CTO).
He’s additionally alleged to have began his personal tech firm with concentrate on AI and machine studying. Ding made himself the CEO of the startup. In November 2023, Ding pitched his firm at an investor convention
“We’ve got expertise with Google’s ten-thousand-card computational energy platform; we simply want to duplicate and improve it — after which additional develop a computational energy platform suited to China’s nationwide situations,” the indictment cited a doc concerning the firm.
“We’ve got strict safeguards to forestall the theft of our confidential industrial info and commerce secrets and techniques. After an investigation, we discovered that this worker stole quite a few paperwork, and we rapidly referred the case to regulation enforcement,” Google’s José Castañeda informed Enterprise Insider.
“We’re grateful to the FBI for serving to defend our info and can proceed cooperating with them intently,” Castañeda added.
IT minister has a response
IT minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar shared a put up, taking a dig at Chinese language ‘innovation’.
“In the meantime Chinese language “innovation” at work …😅😅” he mentioned in a put up on X.
Linwei Ding, aka Leon Ding, allegedly stole commerce secrets and techniques round Google’s AI chip software program and {hardware}. Ding is accused of stealing “from Google over 500 confidential recordsdata containing AI commerce secrets and techniques whereas covertly working for China-based firms looking for an edge within the AI expertise race.”
What knowledge was stolen
In response to the indictment, Ding stole knowledge associated to Google’s tensor processing unit (TPU) chips that powers the corporate’s AI workloads, and work along side Nvidia GPUs to coach in addition to run AI fashions like Gemini.The corporate additionally presents entry to the chips by accomplice platforms like Hugging Face.
Ding, who joined Google as a software program engineer in 2019, was tasked to develop software program utilized in Google’s supercomputing knowledge centres.
“As a result of Ding’s job obligations, he was authorised to entry Google Confidential Info associated to {hardware} infrastructure, the software program platform, and the AI fashions and purposes they supported,” the indictment mentioned.
Google labored as CTO and CEO at similar time
Aside from working for Google, he held two C-suite roles at two totally different firms in China. The indictment mentioned that he spent a number of months in China working for a start-up tech firm that provided him $14,800 monthly to be the corporate’s Chief Expertise Officer (CTO).
He’s additionally alleged to have began his personal tech firm with concentrate on AI and machine studying. Ding made himself the CEO of the startup. In November 2023, Ding pitched his firm at an investor convention
“We’ve got expertise with Google’s ten-thousand-card computational energy platform; we simply want to duplicate and improve it — after which additional develop a computational energy platform suited to China’s nationwide situations,” the indictment cited a doc concerning the firm.
“We’ve got strict safeguards to forestall the theft of our confidential industrial info and commerce secrets and techniques. After an investigation, we discovered that this worker stole quite a few paperwork, and we rapidly referred the case to regulation enforcement,” Google’s José Castañeda informed Enterprise Insider.
“We’re grateful to the FBI for serving to defend our info and can proceed cooperating with them intently,” Castañeda added.
IT minister has a response
IT minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar shared a put up, taking a dig at Chinese language ‘innovation’.
“In the meantime Chinese language “innovation” at work …😅😅” he mentioned in a put up on X.
