Chinese software engineer convicted of stealing AI trade secrets from Google

A federal jury in San Francisco convicted a former Google software engineer and Chinese national of economic espionage for stealing artificial intelligence secrets from the tech giant.

The conviction of the engineer, Linwei Ding, 38, is the first successful prosecution related to AI theft by China, the Justice Department said Friday.

John A. Eisenberg, assistant attorney general for national security, said the conviction exposed a calculated breach of trust involving some of the most advanced AI technology in the world.

“Ding abused his privileged access to steal AI trade secrets while pursuing PRC government-aligned ventures,” Mr. Eisenberg said in a statement, referring to the People’s Republic of China. “His duplicity put U.S. technological leadership and competitiveness at risk.”

He was convicted of seven counts of economic espionage and seven counts of theft of trade secrets.

Court documents revealed that Ding worked on Google’s network of supercomputing data centers and in 2022 began moving confidential data and trade secrets including more than 2,000 files into a cloud account.

A year later, Ding founded an AI technology company in China, and Google security investigators discovered the software theft.

The files containing trade secrets were described in an indictment as related to hardware infrastructure and a software platform that allowed Google’s supercomputing data centers to train and serve large AI models.

The trade secrets also were related to Google’s custom-designed SmartNIC, a network interface card used to manage high-speed communication within Google’s AI supercomputers and cloud networking products.

Documents found on Ding’s computer showed that he planned to use the stolen technology to assist the Chinese government’s development of AI technology.

“The trade secrets contain detailed information about the architecture and functionality of [Google’s custom] Tensor Processing Unit] chips and systems and GPU systems, the software that allowed the chips to communicate and execute tasks, and the software that orchestrated thousands of chips into a supercomputer capable of training and executing cutting-edge AI workloads,” the indictment states.

The theft of AI know-how by China comes in the midst of an AI race with the United States for building the advanced technology with both civilian and military uses.

About a year ago, China’s DeepSeek shocked global markets by releasing an AI chatbot produced with lesser-powered microchips than OpenAI’s ChatGPT.

Roman Rozhasvsky, assistant FBI director for counterintelligence and espionage, said the case is the first conviction involving AI-related economic spying charges.

The case “also demonstrates the FBI’s unwavering dedication to protecting American businesses from the increasingly severe threat China poses to our economic and national security,” he said.

U.S. Attorney Craig H. Missakian, of the Northern District of California, said Silicon Valley is the leader in AI innovation that drives economic growth and bolsters national security.

“The jury delivered a clear message today that the theft of this valuable technology will not go unpunished,” he said. “We will vigorously protect American intellectual capital from foreign interests that seek to gain an unfair competitive advantage while putting our national security at risk.”

The jury verdict came after an 11-day trial before U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria for the Northern District of California. Ding was first indicted in March 2024, and a later indictment identified seven categories of trade secrets that were stolen.

“We respect the jury’s verdict, but are disappointed by it,” said Grant P. Fondo, a lawyer for Ding.

Ding faces a maximum prison term of 70 years for the seven trade secrets charges and 105 years for the seven economic espionage counts.

The case is among several Justice Department prosecutions related to Chinese intelligence gathering and economic espionage.

Lee-Anne Mulholland, Google’s vice president of regulatory affairs, said in a statement: “We’re grateful to the jury for making sure justice was served today,” the New York Times reported.