Washington, Jan 31 (NationPress) A federal jury in San Francisco has found a former Google software engineer guilty of illegally acquiring sensitive artificial intelligence trade secrets for the benefit of China. This conviction marks the first instance of AI-related economic espionage charges resulting in a guilty verdict, according to US officials.

Linwei Ding, also known as Leon Ding, aged 38, was convicted on seven counts of economic espionage and seven counts of theft of trade secrets after an 11-day trial overseen by US District Judge Vince Chhabria in the Northern District of California.

Prosecutors stated that Ding pilfered thousands of pages of confidential AI-related documents from Google while simultaneously pursuing technology ventures linked to China.

“This conviction reveals a deliberate breach of trust involving some of the most sophisticated AI technology globally at a pivotal time in AI advancement,” remarked Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg. “Ding exploited his privileged access to steal AI trade secrets while engaging in ventures aligned with the PRC government.

Evidence presented during the trial indicated that Ding stole over 2,000 pages of confidential content from Google's internal systems between May 2022 and April 2023. Prosecutors claimed he uploaded this information to his personal Google Cloud account and subsequently downloaded it to his personal computer shortly before his resignation from the company.

While still employed at Google, Ding covertly aligned himself with two technology firms based in China. In mid-2022, he deliberated on taking the role of chief technology officer at a budding firm in the country. By early 2023, he had established his own artificial intelligence and machine learning company in China and was acting as its CEO.

During investor pitches, Ding asserted that he could create an AI supercomputer by replicating and altering Google's technology. The jury determined that the stolen trade secrets were crucial to the hardware and software that empower Google's data centers to train and operate large AI models.

The stolen material included specific details about Google's custom Tensor Processing Unit chips, graphics processing unit systems, and the software facilitating communication between these chips. It also comprised software utilized to coordinate thousands of chips into AI supercomputers and insights into Google's SmartNIC technology for high-speed networking.

Prosecutors further demonstrated that Ding sought backing from the Chinese government. In late 2023, he applied for a government-sponsored talent initiative in Shanghai, expressing intentions to “assist China in achieving computing power capabilities that meet international standards.”

FBI San Francisco Special Agent in Charge Sanjay Virmani stated that the verdict highlights the government’s dedication to safeguarding innovation. Ding was first indicted in March 2024 and is scheduled to attend a status conference on February 3, 2026. He faces a maximum of 10 years in prison for each theft charge and up to 15 years for each espionage charge.