Ravie LakshmananJan 30, 2026Artificial Intelligence / Financial Espionage
A former Google engineer accused of stealing hundreds of the corporate’s confidential paperwork to construct a startup in China has been convicted within the U.S., the Division of Justice (DoJ) introduced Thursday.
Linwei Ding (aka Leon Ding), 38, was convicted by a federal jury on seven counts of financial espionage and 7 counts of theft of commerce secrets and techniques for taking up 2,000 paperwork containing the tech large’s commerce secrets and techniques associated to synthetic intelligence (AI) know-how for the good thing about the Individuals’s Republic of China (PRC).
“Silicon Valley is on the forefront of synthetic intelligence innovation, pioneering transformative work that drives financial development and strengthens our nationwide safety,” stated U.S. Legal professional Craig H. Missakian. “We are going to vigorously defend American mental capital from international pursuits that search to achieve an unfair aggressive benefit whereas placing our nationwide safety in danger.”
Ding was indicted in March 2024 for transferring delicate proprietary data from Google’s community to his private Google Cloud account. The stolen paperwork included particulars in regards to the firm’s supercomputing knowledge heart infrastructure used for operating AI fashions, the Cluster Administration System (CMS) software program for managing the information facilities, and the AI fashions and functions they supported.
Particularly, the commerce secrets and techniques pertained to –
Structure and performance of Google’s customized Tensor Processing Unit chips and methods, and Google’s Graphics Processing Unit methods
Software program that permits the chips to speak and execute duties
Software program that orchestrates hundreds of chips right into a supercomputer able to coaching and executing cutting-edge AI workloads
Customized-designed SmartNIC, a kind of community interface card used to facilitate high-speed communication inside Google’s AI supercomputers and cloud networking merchandise
The theft occurred between Might 2022 and April 2023. Ding, who joined Google in 2019, is claimed to have affiliated himself with two tech corporations based mostly in China, together with a startup named Shanghai Zhisuan Applied sciences Co., which he based in 2023, whereas he was employed by the agency. Ding downloaded the paperwork to his pc in December 2023, lower than two weeks earlier than resigning from Google.
“Round June 2022, Ding was in discussions to be the Chief Know-how Officer for an early-stage know-how firm based mostly within the PRC; by early 2023, Ding was within the means of founding his personal know-how firm within the PRC centered on AI and machine studying and was appearing as the corporate’s CEO,” the DoJ stated.
The 2024 incident additionally alleged that the defendant took plenty of deceitful steps to cowl up the theft of commerce secrets and techniques, together with copying the information from Google supply recordsdata into the Apple Notes software on his company-provided MacBook after which changing the notes to PDF recordsdata earlier than importing them to his Google account.
Moreover, prosecutors accused Ding of asking one other Google worker to make use of his company-issued entry badge to scan into the doorway of a Google constructing, and provides the impression that he was working from the workplace when, in actual fact, he was in China. The scheme unravelled in late 2023 when Google discovered that he had given a public presentation in China to potential buyers about his startup.
In February 2025, Ding was charged with financial espionage, with the superseding indictment additionally claiming he utilized to a Shanghai-based “expertise” sponsored by Beijing. The indictment additionally known as out these expertise applications for encouraging people engaged in analysis and improvement outdoors the nation to come back to China to contribute to the nation’s financial and technological development.
“Ding’s software for this expertise plan said that he deliberate to ‘assist China to have computing energy infrastructure capabilities which are on par with the worldwide stage,'” the DoJ stated. “The proof at trial additionally confirmed that Ding supposed to profit two entities managed by the federal government of China by helping with the event of an AI supercomputer and collaborating on the analysis and improvement of customized machine studying chips.”
Ding is scheduled to seem at a standing convention on February 3, 2026. He faces a most sentence of 10 years in jail for every rely of theft of commerce secrets and techniques and 15 years in jail for every financial espionage rely.
