Superseding Indictment Charges Chinese National in Relation to Alleged Plan to Steal Proprietary AI Technology
A.gov site belongs to a main federal government organization in the United States.
Secure.gov sites utilize HTTPS
A lock (Lock Locked padlock) or https:// means you've safely linked to the.gov site. Share sensitive details only on authorities, secure websites.
- About - The Chief law officer
- Organizational Chart
- Budget & Performance
- History
- Privacy Program
- Press Releases - Speeches - Videos - Photo Galleries
- Blogs
- Podcasts
- Guidance Documents - Forms - Publications - Details for Victims in Large Cases - Justice Manual
-
Business and demo.qkseo.in Contracts
- Why Justice? - Benefits - DOJ Vacancies
- Legal Careers at DOJ
Utilities
- About - News - Internships
- FOIA
- Contact
- Details for Journalists
- About - title=" About" About - The Attorney general of the United States - Organizational Chart
- Budget & Performance - History
- Privacy Program
- title=" News" News - Press Releases
- Speeches - Videos - Photo Galleries
- Blogs
- Podcasts
- title=" Guidance & Resources" Resources - Guidance Documents
- Forms
- Publications - Details for Victims in Large Cases
- Justice Manual
-
Business and Contracts
- Employment - Why Justice?
- Benefits
- DOJ Vacancies
- Legal Careers at DOJ
- Our Offices - Find Aid
- Contact Us
Breadcrumb
1. Justice.gov
- Office of Public Affairs
- News
- Press Releases
- Superseding Indictment Charges Chinese National In Relation To Alleged Plan To Steal Proprietary AI Technology
MENU News
- All News - Blogs
- Photo Galleries
- Podcasts
- Press Releases
- Speeches
- Videos
Archived Press Releases
Archived News
Para Notícias en Español
Superseding Indictment Charges Chinese National in Relation to Alleged Plan to Steal Proprietary AI Technology
- Facebook - X.
- LinkedIn.
- Email
Note: View the superseding indictment here.
A federal grand jury returned a superseding indictment today charging Linwei Ding, also referred to as Leon Ding, 38, with 7 counts of financial espionage and seven counts of theft of trade secrets in connection with a supposed strategy to take from Google LLC (Google) proprietary details connected to AI technology.
Ding was initially arraigned in March 2024 on 4 counts of theft of trade secrets. The superseding indictment returned today explains seven classifications of trade tricks stolen by Ding and charges Ding with 7 counts of financial espionage and 7 counts of theft of trade tricks.
According to the superseding indictment, Google hired Ding as a software application engineer in 2019. Between approximately May 2022 and May 2023, Ding published more than 1,000 unique files containing Google confidential details from Google's network to his personal Google Cloud account, including the trade secrets alleged in the superseding indictment.
While Ding was employed by Google, he secretly associated himself with two People's Republic of China (PRC)- based innovation companies. Around June 2022, Ding remained in discussions to be the Chief Technology Officer for an early-stage technology company based in the PRC. By May 2023, Ding had actually founded his own technology company concentrated on AI and artificial intelligence in the PRC and was serving as the business's CEO.
The superseding indictment alleges that Ding intended to benefit the PRC government by stealing trade secrets from Google. Ding allegedly took technology connecting to the hardware infrastructure and software platform that permits Google's supercomputing information center to train and serve big AI models. The trade tricks contain detailed details about the architecture and performance of Google's Tensor Processing Unit (TPU) chips and systems and Google's Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) systems, the software application that enables the chips to communicate and execute jobs, and the software application that orchestrates thousands of chips into a supercomputer capable of training and performing innovative AI work. The trade tricks likewise pertain to Google's custom-made SmartNIC, a type of network user interface card utilized to improve Google's GPU, high efficiency, and cloud networking products.
As declared, Ding flowed a PowerPoint presentation to employees of his innovation business mentioning PRC nationwide policies motivating the development of the domestic AI market. He also created a PowerPoint discussion containing an application to a PRC talent program based in Shanghai. The superseding indictment explains how PRC-sponsored skill programs incentivize individuals engaged in research and advancement outside the PRC to transfer that knowledge and research study to the PRC in exchange for wages, research funds, lab area, or kenpoguy.com other rewards. Ding's application for the talent program mentioned that his "will help China to have computing power infrastructure capabilities that are on par with the international level."
If convicted, Ding deals with a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail and up to a $250,000 fine for elearnportal.science each trade-secret count and 15 years in jail and $5,000,000 fine for each economic-espionage count. A federal district court judge will identify any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory elements.
The FBI is examining the case.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Casey Boome and Molly K. Priedeman for the Northern District of California and Trial Attorneys Stephen Marzen and Yifei Zheng of the National Security Division's Counterintelligence and Export Control Section are prosecuting the case.
Today's action was coordinated through the Justice and Commerce Departments' Disruptive Technology Strike Force. The Disruptive Technology Strike Force is an interagency law enforcement strike force co-led by the Departments of Justice and Commerce created to target illicit actors, protect supply chains, and wikitravel.org prevent crucial innovation from being obtained by authoritarian routines and hostile nation-states.
A superseding indictment is simply a claims. All defendants are presumed innocent up until proven guilty beyond an affordable doubt in a law court.