Second Apple Hardware Engineer Charged with Stealing Trade Secrets for China

cageymaru

cageymaru

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An Apple hardware engineer working in the top secret "Project Titan" autonomous vehicle division has been arrested for stealing trade secrets. A fellow Apple employee witnessed Jizhong Chen taking unauthorized pictures of the vehicle. He also neglected to tell Apple that he had been hired by an autonomous vehicle company in China. He was caught when he tried to board a flight to China. When confronted, he admitted to backing up 2,000 files containing manuals and schematics from the project to his personal hard drive. This is the second Apple engineer caught trying to board a plane to China with Apple autonomous vehicle trade secrets. Thanks TheCommander !

Apple said disclosure of the data taken by Chen would be "enormously damaging," according to prosecutors. Among the photos seized by the government: an image stamped Dec. 19 diagramming Apple's autonomous driving architecture. Another from June 2018 depicts an assembly drawing of a wire harness for an autonomous vehicle. The engineer later told Apple he intended to travel to China to visit his ill father, but was arrested last week before he could board his direct flight. He was released from federal custody after posting $500,000 in cash and property on Jan. 25.
 
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sleepybp

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How the F*ck did he post $500,000 cash/assets bail?
These engineers are well paid!
Also, to those of you stating maybe Apple treated engineer like shit, it doesn't fucking matter.
If you are unhappy with your job you can quit, and find another.
This is IP theft and it allows the billions of dollars of R&D that boosts our economy (10000 engineers) to be copied by China where they will pay sweatshop wages to produce their version of the product essentially for free (no R&D, no engineering jobs).
No one wins in that scenario, except the executives of the Chinese company.
 
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UnrealCpu

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sleepybp said:
How the F*ck did he post $500,000 cash/assets bail?
These engineers are well paid!
Also, to those of you stating maybe Apple treated engineer like shit, it doesn't fucking matter.
If you are unhappy with your job you can quit, and find another.
This is IP theft and it allows the billions of dollars of R&D that boosts our economy (10000 engineers) to be copied by China where they will pay sweatshop wages to produce their version of the product essentially for free (no R&D, no engineering jobs).
No one wins in that scenario, except the executives of the Chinese company.
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yeah thank you ,

the kid that wants to complain that they treat their asian engineers like shit is pretty dam funny if you ask me . It doesnt matter how much you pay someone or how you treat them. If they have dual citizenship or family in a different country they will sell trade secrets and run.
They did this all along for years with the F22 raptor and stealth technology. Now china has a POS plane that they think can compete with F22 and F35 jets

Dont trust the chinese and dont buy Huwei products

i hope they hang this guy buy his tiny asian nutsack
 
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viper1152012

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China's stealing SECRETS!!
5c09j9U.gif
 
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Reimu

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UnrealCpu said:
stop hiring chinese

that reminds me i need to file a charge back dispute on ali express right now.
Click to expand...
The thing is, it's really cheap to hire Chinese Ph.Ds. It's an enormous savings at 1:3 even today.

UnrealCpu said:
the guy is a spy nuff said. He should be hanged from a telephone pole , just like the huwei CEO
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Huawei's President is a rank and file member of the party cadre who's in the PLA. You are being too kind. They switch out CEO quite frequently btw.
 
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cyclone3d

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This kind of thing keeps happening. Makes me think that we should ban Chinese from being hired. Either that or a long probation period and the stipulation that EVERYHTING they do on the job and off will be monitored with implanted tracking devices as well as body cams and mics.

Also banning of import of products from any Chinese company that hires people to steal trade secrets.
 
[Spectre]

[Spectre]

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Elios said:
also if Apple didnt treat there engineer like shit it wouldnt happen
Click to expand...

It seems to me a spy wouldn't care if they were being treated like shit by the people they were spying on because.....they are spying on them and being compensated elsewhere for their spying so it kind of goes with the territory.
 
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Reimu

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cyclone3d said:
This kind of thing keeps happening. Makes me think that we should ban Chinese from being hired. Either that or a long probation period and the stipulation that EVERYHTING they do on the job and off will be monitored with implanted tracking devices as well as body cams and mics.

Also banning of import of products from any Chinese company that hires people to steal trade secrets.
Click to expand...

Hmm. I don't think you can curb the issue that way, since the Chinese will bribe, hack or outright acquire the tech by buyout as well, and you know from the Cold War that it takes more than just a blockade to prevent such espionage and theft.
 
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rolling_tiger

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UnrealCpu said:
ok you have no proof so your argument is pointless

the guy is a spy nuff said. He should be hanged from a telephone pole , just like the huwei CEO
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Proof...

It's the internet. I'm not telling anyone on the internet my secrets. That may be something you like to do on your free time.

When I see a story like this, I think Apple's layers of security almost failed entirely. It usually doesn't get this far with all the restrictions they already have in place
 
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Reimu

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rolling_tiger said:
Proof...

It's the internet. I'm not telling anyone on the internet my secrets. That may be something you like to do on your free time.

When I see a story like this, I think Apple's layers of security almost failed entirely. It usually doesn't get this far with all the restrictions they already have in place
Click to expand...

On the other hand, espionage work such as thing involve a whole cabal, not just one single engineer. There's a part of me that still thinks that Apple under Steve Jobs wouldn't have this episode play out, but another part wonders just how deep this rabbit hole of personal connections go.
 
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UnrealCpu

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Paul_Johnson said:
It seems to me a spy wouldn't care if they were being treated like shit by the people they were spying on because.....they are spying on them and being compensated elsewhere for their spying so it kind of goes with the territory.
Click to expand...

i agree with your statement and makes total sense. The problem is we give too much authority and power to dual citizens with top secret information and obviously apple needs to spend more money and do proper security checks on anyone that could be a threat in the future. Either way a rogue agent in apple even if he was 100% american could always sell out to a foreign government and retire with millions in SW asia country then disappear living off his stolen money.

These spies no how do it easily by either having family members, friends, in foreign countries as well as knowing how the banking system works to hide money in foreign accounts. I would not be surprised if these ph.d engineers are spending 4-5 months out of the year in China ,

with all the crap going on with CEO of Huwei , i would not doubt china is doing whatever they can to stir the pot.

I
 
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UnrealCpu

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rolling_tiger said:
Proof...

It's the internet. I'm not telling anyone on the internet my secrets. That may be something you like to do on your free time.

When I see a story like this, I think Apple's layers of security almost failed entirely. It usually doesn't get this far with all the restrictions they already have in place
Click to expand...


i guess we never went to the moon too because the proof is on the internet.

You would certainly fail a masters degree course called researching on the internet

you should learn to elaborate your sentences alittle more so we can all understand what the hell you are trying to say

mayeb just maybe this guy is a foreign agent on hardocp

broken english
 
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rolling_tiger

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UnrealCpu said:
i guess we never went to the moon too because the proof is on the internet.

You would certainly fail a masters degree course called researching on the internet

you should learn to elaborate your sentences alittle more so we can all understand what the hell you are trying to say
Click to expand...

I like you. I hope you keep posting on Hardforums.
 
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Flogger23m

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But open borders are great! Quick, lets hire more foreign nationals. More H1Bs too while we're at it. /S
 
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Deleted member 243478

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rolling_tiger said:
Proof...

It's the internet. I'm not telling anyone on the internet my secrets. That may be something you like to do on your free time.

When I see a story like this, I think Apple's layers of security almost failed entirely. It usually doesn't get this far with all the restrictions they already have in place
Click to expand...

Sounds like it worked to me, they caught him.

You dont arrest someone boarding a flight on a whim... they were watching him and waiting for the right time to really screw him.
 
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theBrownLlama

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Elios said:
also if Apple didnt treat there engineer like shit it wouldnt happen
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it's not that.

It is because China treats leaker, hackers and stealers extremely well. If the dude managed to get to China with that (and it's actually good stuff), dude's prob have this life and extended family set for life.
 
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serious

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UnrealCpu said:
stop hiring chinese

that reminds me i need to file a charge back dispute on ali express right now.
Click to expand...
You have been brain washed by the media. Look up Oculus and see if you will draw the conclusion to not hire white people.
 
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Creig

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Reimu said:
The thing is, it's really cheap to hire Chinese Ph.Ds. It's an enormous savings at 1:3 even today.
Click to expand...

Does that enormous savings take into account for the lost value for IP theft? Seems like a situation of trying to save pennies in order to lose dollars.
 
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Reimu

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Creig said:
Does that enormous savings take into account for the lost value for IP theft? Seems like a situation of trying to save pennies in order to lose dollars.
Click to expand...

That's the question that I have as well. Although the Chinese will buy that knowledge with cold hard cash if need be. That stuff's important enough to die for.
 
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Jagger100

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Reimu said:
The thing is, it's really cheap to hire Chinese Ph.Ds. It's an enormous savings at 1:3 even today.
Click to expand...

How expensive is it to reclaim your IP based competitive advantage against someone who has your IP and access to cheap labor.

When China slams the door, everyone who invested with them is Screwed, corporation or private investors alike. No tears shall be shed here.
 
HAL_404

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back in the wild west days of America, they used to publicly hang people who stole horses and/or livestock ... just saying
 
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Reimu

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Jagger100 said:
How expensive is it to reclaim your IP based competitive advantage against someone who has your IP and access to cheap labor.

When China slams the door, everyone who invested with them is Screwed, corporation or private investors alike. No tears shall be shed here.
Click to expand...

That's the question I want to pose to Taiwan, who's the first enabler of PRC. It's invested substantially, maybe closer to 300 billion dollars than the reported 87 billion. They were the ones who went in right after Tian'anmen and they were the bridge builders for Japan and America to follow after China's admittance into WTO.
 
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