The US Justice Division has charged a former Google software program engineer with stealing synthetic intelligence-related commerce secrets and techniques from the corporate, with a watch to utilizing it at two AI-related companies he was related to in China.
If convicted, Linwei Ding, aka Leon Ding, faces as much as 10 years in jail and a advantageous of $250,000 on every of the 4 counts of commerce secrets and techniques theft on which he has been indicted.
Some examples of the kind of knowledge that Ding allegedly pilfered embody the chip structure and software program design specs for 2 new tensor processor variations for machine studying and AI; full technical particulars of GPUs at Google’s supercomputing knowledge facilities; and software program design specs for the central cluster administration system (CMS) at these facilities.
Defending Towards Commerce Secret Theft
Legal professional Common Merrick Garland introduced the fees at an American Bar Affiliation occasion in San Francisco this week. He highlighted it for instance of the vigor with which the US authorities will pursue these caught stealing secrets and techniques associated to AI and different superior applied sciences to profit America’s rivals.
“The Justice Division is not going to tolerate the theft of synthetic intelligence and different superior applied sciences that might put our nationwide safety in danger,” Garland mentioned in an announcement. “We are going to fiercely defend delicate applied sciences developed in America from falling into the fingers of those that shouldn’t have them.”
Google employed Ding, 38, a Chinese language nationwide and resident of Newark, Calif., as a software program engineer in Might 2019. Indictment papers unsealed March 6 in US District Court docket for the Northern District of California described Ding’s job duties as together with software program improvement for optimizing graphics processing models (GPUs) for machine studying, at Google’s supercomputing facilities. The job gave Ding approved entry to reams of confidential info associated to the {hardware} infrastructure, software program platform, AI fashions, and the purposes they supported at Google’s supercomputing facilities.
The indictment charged Ding with utilizing his approved entry to pilfer some 500 distinctive information containing Google AI-related commerce secrets and techniques and secretly importing them to a private Google Cloud account. The alleged illicit exercise started in Might 2022 and continued by way of Might 2023.
Affiliating With Rivals
In Might 2023, Ding is alleged to have quietly based Shanghai Zhisuan Know-how, a China-based firm centered on growing a CMS that promised to speed up ML workloads and pace up AI mannequin coaching. Shortly thereafter, Ding, appearing as CEO of his startup, utilized for and bought acceptance to a China-based incubation program for high-tech startups. In pitching his firm to buyers with the incubator, Ding is alleged to have brazenly touted his Google expertise, and said that his purpose to “replicate and improve” Google’s know-how to “develop a computational energy platform suited to China’s nationwide circumstances.”
Individually, and beginning someday final June — a month after he had accomplished his alleged knowledge theft — Ding additionally started corresponding with the CEO of an early-stage know-how startup in China that developed software program for accelerating machine studying on GPUs. The CEO provided Ding $14,800 a month plus an annual bonus and firm inventory to hitch the corporate as its chief know-how officer. Ding is alleged to have traveled to China in October 2022, staying on till the top of final March, throughout which period he tried to lift capital for the corporate in his function as CTO.
Ding resigned from Google on Dec. 26, a few weeks after he allegedly uploaded a set of further paperwork containing confidential info from Google’s community to his personal non-public account. Ding had defined that add away to Google investigators who detected the exercise. However after he resigned, a subsequent investigation uncovered Ding’s alleged knowledge theft, resulting in Google’s investigators retrieving Ding’s Google laptop computer and cellular gadget from him.
A Historical past of Insiders Stealing Secrets and techniques for China
The FBI seized Ding’s digital gadgets and different proof after they executed a search warrant on his residence in early January. They found the theft of the five hundred information when going by way of the contents of his Ding’s private Google accounts for which they obtained a separate search warrant. The FBI arrested Ding in Newark earlier this week.
Ding’s arrest and indictment focuses consideration as soon as once more on what the US authorities and others have described because the rampant theft of US commerce secrets and techniques and mental property by people and brokers working for China-based corporations lately. In lots of cases, cyber-threat teams — typically considered engaged on behalf of the Chinese language authorities — have been those accountable for the heists.
However as with the most recent arrest, there have been a number of current cases during which people working for US corporations have stolen secrets and techniques and tried to move them on to Chinese language corporations and entities. In February 2024, the US authorities accused Chenguang Gong, a naturalized American citizen, of stealing nuclear secrets and techniques from a California protection contractor an trying to move it on to China’s army. Final Might, a federal jury indicted former Apple worker Weibo Wang of trying to steal info associated to autonomous car know-how and utilizing it at a China-based firm in the identical house.
