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Thou Shalt Not Steal (Secrets of the Apple Car)

Prison and big fine for this former Apple engineer who stole the brand's secrets to try to sell them to Chinese competition.

In 2018 Xiaolang Zhang worked at Apple on the “Titan” project, the famous Apple Car. One day, under the pretext of going to see his sick mother in China, he took a few days off, not without first stealing a 25-page document detailing the electronics of the autonomous vehicle. Purpose of the maneuver -discovered a posteriori- to resell these secrets to a Chinese competitor called XMotors.

Prison and fine for the thief of the secrets of the Apple Car project…££££

The Apple security team manages to catch the bandit at the airport before he leaves the territory, and after maintaining his innocence, he finally pleaded guilty in 2022 to reduce his sentence. The latter was recently handed down: 120 days in prison, three years suspended, and a fine of nearly $150,000. A rather lenient decision when we know that Zhang initially risked up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Not sure Apple wants to hire him again though… Source: 9to5mac

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