A former Apple engineer, Weibao Wang, has been charged with stealing the company’s self-driving car technology after fleeing to China almost five years ago. The indictment accuses Wang, 35, of theft or attempted theft of trade secrets, alleging that he unlawfully acquired thousands of files containing proprietary information while working for an undisclosed Chinese company. This marks the third instance of an ex-Apple employee being accused of stealing autonomous tech secrets for China.
The US Justice Department claims that Wang illicitly obtained source code for the software and hardware powering Apple’s self-driving systems. Wang joined Apple in 2016 as part of the autonomous systems development team and had signed a confidentiality agreement regarding the project. Unbeknownst to Apple, he accepted a job offer at a Chinese company working on self-driving cars more than four months before leaving Apple in April 2018.
While Wang assured authorities that he had no intentions of leaving the US, he purchased a one-way ticket to Guangzhou, China, the same day law enforcement searched his home in Mountain View, California, in June 2018. Analysis of devices seized from Wang’s residence revealed a significant amount of Apple’s self-driving car technology data.
The US Attorney for the Northern District of California, Ismail Ramsey, stated during a press conference that Wang is currently in China. If he were to be extradited and convicted, he could face up to 10 years in prison for each of the six charges.
Apple has not provided a comment in response to requests for statements on the matter. Two other former Apple employees have previously faced charges related to the theft of trade secrets, with Xiaolang Zhang pleading guilty last year and Jizhong Chen currently facing similar accusations.