Apple Accuses Former Engineer of Taking Vision Pro Secrets To Snap (theregister.com) 14
Apple has filed (PDF) a lawsuit against former Vision Pro engineer Di Liu, accusing him of stealing thousands of confidential files related to his work on Apple's augmented reality headset for the benefit of his new employer Snap. The company alleges Liu misled colleagues about his departure, secretly accepted a job offer from Snap, and attempted to cover his tracks by deleting files -- actions Apple claims violated his confidentiality agreement. The Register reports: Liu secretly received a job offer from Snap on October 18, 2024, a role the complaint describes as "substantially similar" to his Apple position, meaning Liu waited nearly two weeks to resign from Apple, per the lawsuit. "Even then, he did not disclose he was leaving for Snap," the suit said. "Apple would not have allowed Mr. Liu continued access had he told the truth." Liu allegedly copied "more than a dozen folders containing thousands of files" from Apple's filesystem to a personal cloud storage account, dropping the stolen bits in a pair of nested folders with the amazingly nondescript names "Personal" and "Knowledge."
Apple said that data Liu copied includes "filenames containing confidential Apple product code names" and files "marked as Apple confidential." Company research, product design, and supply chain management documents were among the content Liu is accused of stealing. The complaint also alleges that Liu deleted files to conceal his activities, a move that may hinder Apple's ability to determine the full scope of the data he exfiltrated. "Mr. Liu additionally took actions to conceal his theft, including deceiving Apple about his job at Snap, and deleting files from his Apple-issued computer that might have let Apple determine what data Mr. Liu stole," the complaint noted.
Whatever he has, Apple wants it back. The company demands a jury trial on a single count of breach of contract under a confidentiality and intellectual property agreement Liu was bound to. It also asks the court to compel Liu to return all misappropriated data, award damages to be determined at trial, and reimburse Apple's costs and attorneys' fees.
Apple said that data Liu copied includes "filenames containing confidential Apple product code names" and files "marked as Apple confidential." Company research, product design, and supply chain management documents were among the content Liu is accused of stealing. The complaint also alleges that Liu deleted files to conceal his activities, a move that may hinder Apple's ability to determine the full scope of the data he exfiltrated. "Mr. Liu additionally took actions to conceal his theft, including deceiving Apple about his job at Snap, and deleting files from his Apple-issued computer that might have let Apple determine what data Mr. Liu stole," the complaint noted.
Whatever he has, Apple wants it back. The company demands a jury trial on a single count of breach of contract under a confidentiality and intellectual property agreement Liu was bound to. It also asks the court to compel Liu to return all misappropriated data, award damages to be determined at trial, and reimburse Apple's costs and attorneys' fees.
Secret Audio Recording Transcript (Score:1, Funny)
"Hello, Snap CEO, my new employer. Here is Apple's Vision Pro secret: Charge $3,500 for something people normally wouldn't pay more than $500. You're welcome."
How would you exfiltrate data? (Score:2)
I simply turn off WiFi, setup a local network, plug in Ethernet and scp files to an ssh server. I also scp all of my files not just some to look like I am taking a backup. I also do this monthly from day 1 and then stop the moment I plan to get another job for some sweet plausible deniability. Not that I have ever done anything like this..
Re: (Score:2)
Eventually your device will go back online and whatever EDR or DLP your company has installed will send the offline logs to a server, same logs which are generated when online. How big do you think the ring buffer is for those logs?
You might have gotten away with it in past, it suggests your employer was utterly incompetent if they didn't notice activity like this.
Re: (Score:2)
flop (Score:2, Flamebait)
Re: (Score:2)
Well duh, Snap is owned by tencent (Score:2)
There is nothing further to say.
CGI (Score:2)
"Vision Pro engineer Di Liu" (Score:1)
No shit he didn't tell them right away... (Score:2)
most people don't have a full break between personal and work even on a work computer account... there will be things that are personal... research you did online, any manner of things that aren't company property. Who wouldn't want to have time between changing gigs to ensure your shit is correctly separated.. your accounts are separated... (i.e. using work email to register for things you might want to retain access to, etc....)
If they had "confidential" files copied... guess apple doesn't support DLP...