Apple Sues OpenAI, Accusing It of Stealing Company Secrets
The two companies struck a deal in 2024 to offer A.I. services on Apple devices, but their partnership has soured.
The two companies struck a deal in 2024 to offer A.I. services on Apple devices, but their partnership has soured.
Apple accused OpenAI on Friday of stealing secrets about products still in development, setting up a legal face-off between two of the world’s biggest tech companies.
In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, the consumer tech giant said OpenAI, a leader in artificial intelligence that has a new hardware business, had asked job candidates from Apple to share details about secret projects and to bring device components and prototypes to their interviews.
Apple also accused an OpenAI employee of downloading internal documents from a laptop owned by the iPhone maker. That employee and OpenAI’s top hardware executive were named as defendants in the suit. Both used to work at Apple.
OpenAI used the confidential information to approach Apple’s manufacturing partners, including asking one partner to demonstrate Apple’s technique for finishing metal on its devices, the lawsuit said.
Apple sent a letter to OpenAI in February to raise concerns that confidential information could be “making its way to OpenAI’s business improperly,” according to the suit. OpenAI did not respond, Apple said.
“OpenAI’s nascent hardware business now rests on the shakiest of foundations, rotten to its core by its illegal reliance on misappropriated trade secrets,” Apple wrote in its lawsuit.
