Overview
- After an 11-day trial in San Francisco, Linwei Ding was found guilty on seven counts of economic espionage and seven counts of trade‑secret theft.
- Prosecutors said he copied more than 2,000 pages of confidential Google AI materials between May 2022 and April 2023 to a personal cloud account, then downloaded them to a home computer in December 2023 before resigning.
- Jurors found the stolen information covered Google’s AI supercomputing infrastructure, including TPU and GPU systems, orchestration software, and custom SmartNIC technology.
- Evidence showed Ding secretly affiliated with two China-based tech firms, pitched investors on reproducing Google’s technology, and applied to a Shanghai government talent program.
- He faces up to 15 years per espionage count and 10 years per theft count, with a status conference set for Feb. 3; authorities noted Google was not charged and cooperated with the investigation.