Ex-Apple engineer pleads guilty to stealing automotive data


Xiaolang Zhang, a former Apple employee charged by the FBI in 2018 with stealing trade secrets about Apple’s self-driving vehicle project, pleaded guilty in federal court in San Jose on Monday.

Xiaolang Zhang stole the Apple brand’s trade secrets as he prepared to work for Chinese electric vehicle startup Xiaopeng Motors, also known as XPeng. The FBI arrested the suspect at the airport in San Jose, California on July 7 while he was en route to China.

Xiaolang Zhang was hired by Apple in 2015, where he notably worked on hardware for Apple’s secret self-driving vehicle project.

A highly responsive 25-page PDF

According to CNBC, Apple suspected Xiaolang Zhang of stealing trade secrets after he took paternity leave and traveled to China with his family. Upon returning to the United States in April 2018, he met with his supervisor to tender his resignation and explained that he wanted to move to China to take care of his mother.

After Xiaolang Zhang told Apple he planned to work for Xmotors, the iPhone maker cut off his network access. A subsequent investigation by Apple revealed that it had downloaded documents and information from Apple’s databases.

In addition to uploading intellectual property trade secrets, he also took a circuit board and a server from Apple’s automotive labs.

But the key document, which formed the basis of the charge to which he pleaded guilty, was a 25-page PDF file containing highly sensitive circuit board electrical diagrams.

Ex-employee faces up to 10 years in prison

Court documents released by CNBC indicate that Xiaolang Zhang pleaded guilty to the single count of stealing the schematics. The ex-employee now faces up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

According to CNBC, the engineer designed and tested circuit boards for sensors on the self-driving car project’s IT team.

XMotors told the BBC in 2018 that it had not received any “sensitive information” from the engineer.

Despite long-running rumors that Apple is working on an autonomous vehicle, the company has never publicly acknowledged the project.

Source: ZDNet.com





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