Apple accuses OpenAI of stealing trade secrets and destroying evidence in escalated lawsuit

Apple escalated its trade-secret lawsuit against OpenAI in a federal court filing, accusing the artificial intelligence company of utilizing stolen proprietary information and actively destroying evidence.

Core Allegations and Response:

The tech giant stated that it recently examined an Apple-issued MacBook used by Chang Liu, a former iPhone engineer who left Apple to join OpenAI.

According to Apple's forensic review, Liu downloaded a confidential Apple circuit schematic and used it directly in his work at OpenAI.

Apple’s legal team claimed the laptop contains proof that Liu learned he was under internal investigation and subsequently sent instructions to an OpenAI colleague on how to destroy evidence—instructions the colleague allegedly confirmed she would follow.

The iPhone maker also claimed that Liu and other OpenAI personnel were well aware that he retained unauthorized access to Apple's third-party cloud storage accounts.

On the contrary, OpenAI has pushed to have the lawsuit dismissed, maintaining that it does not possess or want any of Apple's trade secrets and that its hiring practices follow standard industry guidelines.

OpenAI previously argued that any lingering access to Apple files was the result of Apple's own failure to properly manage system and cloud access when employees depart, noting that former colleagues had reached out to Liu for help locating older files.

As reported, the legal feud comes amid an increasingly bitter rivalry between the two tech giants, heightened by OpenAI aggressively hiring hundreds of former Apple engineers and designers such as former design chief Jony Ive as OpenAI expands deeper into hardware development.