Apple says more ex-employees may have taken confidential data to OpenAI
TechCrunch Sarah Perez ● Covered by 7 sources
Apple says its trade secrets case against OpenAI may involve even more ex-employees than first named. It's now asking for a fast-track injunction to stop OpenAI's device work built on its tech.
Based on reporting by TechCrunch, Sarah Perez — read the original for the full story.
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Apple's legal fight with OpenAI just got bigger, and messier. The company is now pushing for a preliminary injunction that would block OpenAI from moving ahead with any device or product built using Apple's technology, and it's asking the court for expedited discovery from a growing list of names: senior systems engineer Chang Liu, Chief Hardware Officer Tang Yew Tan, OpenAI and its foundation, and io, the hardware startup co-founded by Apple's former design chief Jony Ive.
What's new here isn't just the injunction request. It's the scope. Apple says its investigation has turned up 11 additional former employees who may have been witnesses to, or participants in, the alleged theft of trade secrets, on top of the people already named in the original complaint, including OpenAI employee Yu-Ting Peng. That's a meaningful expansion from a case that started with a handful of named individuals.
The details in the filing read like something out of a corporate espionage script. One former Apple employee allegedly met with Liu and Peng before Peng's OpenAI interview and discussed proprietary information tied to unannounced products. Another allegedly took screenshots of confidential documents about an unreleased Apple product ahead of an OpenAI interview. And after Apple filed its original complaint, Apple says multiple former employees now at OpenAI reached out on their own to return company-issued devices they'd held onto since leaving. Apple is framing that last detail as a sign that the circle of people involved is wider than anyone initially disclosed.
OpenAI isn't taking this quietly. In a blog post, the company called Apple's injunction request
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
Apple flexing legal muscle here feels less like a slam-dunk case and more like a company trying to control the narrative around a high-profile departure of talent to a competitor. If Apple genuinely believes its IP walked out the door, fine, fight it in court. But leaning on device-return anecdotes and screenshots without landing a clean smoking gun makes this look as much like reputation management as litigation, and that pattern of big tech firms weaponizing trade secrets claims against rivals poaching staff is getting old.
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