A Chinese national faces a substantial stint in prison and heavy fines if found guilty of several additional charges related to economic espionage and theft of trade secrets at Google.
Linwei Ding, 38, known to colleagues as Leon Ding, is accused of stealing and transmitting back to Chinese companies more than a thousand files related to Google’s proprietary AI work between 2022 and 2023.
You may recall Ding’s tale from March last year when he was charged with four counts of theft of trade secrets. A new superseding indictment brings additional charges this week: seven counts of theft of trade secrets and seven counts of economic espionage.
The story outlined by prosecutors reveals some of the cunning ways technology could be hypothetically illegally transferred between borders, although it is an allegation at this point.
Ding was hired as a software engineer in 2019 and worked on the software platform deployed in Google’s supercomputing datacenters, according to the superseding indictment returned by a federal grand jury this week.
Specifically, he worked on software that enabled GPUs to run more efficiently for machine learning and AI applications. Prosecutors say he was, therefore, granted special access to Google’s confidential data related to the areas in which he worked: supercomputer datacenters, AI, and hardware infrastructure.
Despite Google deploying data loss prevention mechanisms designed to detect any suspicious movement of files, confidential or otherwise, across its network, it wasn’t until December 2023 that the company became aware of Ding’s alleged activity.
However, going by the allegations in the indictment, there may be an interesting way of circumventing those data loss mechanisms. The indictment alleges that Ding copied the content from Google source files directly into an Apple Notes document on his company-issued MacBook, saved the document as a PDF, and transferred that PDF to his personal account.
The superseding indictment alleges that Ding began periodically copying Google’s AI secrets to his personal Google Cloud account in May 2022, claiming he stopped almost exactly a year later in May 2023.
Prosecutors claim the trade secrets spanned seven categories:
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Internal specs and other details related to the four primary components of Google’s Tensor Processing Unit (TPU) chips
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Design and operation documents related to TPU chips, machines, and systems
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TPU software design documents
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Design and operation documents of Google’s GPU machines and systems
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Google GPU software designs
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Design specs used to implement a proprietary chip component to deliver low-latency and high-bandwidth transfers of data over large-scale networks on Google’s SmartNIC
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Design docs on implementing software related to high-performance and cloud networking on Google’s SmartNIC
Around a month after Ding allegedly started copying these files, he received a job offer from a Chinese AI startup, Beijing Rongshu Lianzhi Technology, to be its CTO with a monthly remuneration of around $14,800, plus bonuses and stock options, say prosecutors.
Ding traveled to meet Rongshu’s leadership in October 2022 and stayed there until March 2023, according to the indictment, during which time he remained a Google employee but also participated in investor meetings for the startup and was presented as the CTO.
Days after Ding allegedly stopped lifting Google files, he founded a startup in China called Shanghai Zhisuan Technology and acted as its CEO. The company touted itself as one that developed a cluster management system to accelerate ML workloads such as those used to train AI models.
The indictment also alleges that Ding successfully applied to the MiraclePlus startup incubation program and agreed to sell 7 percent of the company to the incubator in return for capital investment in November 2023.
A company document allegedly circulated on WeChat later that month, claiming: “We have experience with Google’s ten-thousand-card computational power platform; we just need to replicate and upgrade it – and then further develop a computational power platform suited to China’s national conditions.”
Ding allegedly created a pitch deck the following month to apply for state funding made available to researchers, stating that Zhisuan’s product would help the state achieve computing capabilities on par with international standards. An internal company memo also allegedly stated that the company would make its tech available to the government.
It is claimed that Ding never told Google about his work with either Rongshu or Zhisuan during this time.
The attempted escape
Google alleges that it finally clocked Ding’s supposed file copying in December 2023, when he is said to have copied more files to a separate Google Drive account. Days later, it claims a company investigator quizzed Ding about this and he claimed he was copying the files to keep as evidence of his work at Google, but had no intentions of leaving the company.
After signing a self-deletion affidavit, promising to delete the files he copied, he booked a one-way flight to Beijing from San Francisco set to depart on January 7, 2024. On Boxing Day 2023, he confirmed his resignation from Google, saying his last day would be on January 5.
According to the indictment, Google became aware of Ding’s leadership of Zhisuan and its meeting with MiraclePlus on December 29. It promptly locked his company-issued laptop and revoked his network access.
On the same day, Google examined surveillance footage and claims it showed a different employee (who wasn’t Ding) badged in at the Google office to make it seem like Ding was working from Google HQ while he was actually in China. That employee claimed that Ding asked them to badge in for him while he was away.
Google’s security people collected Ding’s company laptop and phone on January 4, and two days later the FBI searched his residence, seizing various devices. The feds allegedly found the stolen files on January 13, but Ding wasn’t arrested until March 6.
It’s not specifically stated in either the original arrest warrant [PDF] or in the superseded indictment [PDF], but when FBI search warrants are issued for serious crimes, it’s not uncommon for passport restrictions to be applied. Given that Ding was arrested months after his escape flight was due to take off, it’s likely he never boarded due to the restrictions imposed alongside the search warrant.
“Today’s charges are the latest illustration of the lengths affiliates of companies based in the People’s Republic of China are willing to go to steal American innovation,” said former FBI Director Christopher Wray at the time of Ding’s arrest.
“The theft of innovative technology and trade secrets from American companies can cost jobs and have devastating economic and national security consequences. The FBI will continue its efforts to vigorously pursue those responsible for stealing US companies’ intellectual property and most closely guarded secrets.”
If found guilty, Ding faces a maximum ten-year prison stint and a $250,000 fine for each of the trade secret counts, and 15 years in prison and a $5 million fine for each of the seven economic espionage counts. ®
