Ex-Google employees charged for ‘stealing trade secrets’ around Pixel’s Tensor chip
Source: 9to5Google
Charges and individuals
US courts have charged three individuals, including two former Google employees, with 14 felony counts of conspiracy, theft of trade secrets, and destroying evidence in connection with Google’s Tensor chips for Pixel phones. The indictment (USA v. Ghandali, 26‑cr‑00071) was unsealed on Thursday.
- Samaneh Ghandali – former hardware engineer at Google.
- Soroor Ghandali – former Google intern.
- Mohammadjavad Khosravi – Samaneh’s husband, who worked at another tech company and had applied to Google multiple times.
Both Samaneh and Soroor later worked at a different tech company, while Khosravi was employed elsewhere at the time of the alleged theft.
Google’s response
A Google spokesperson said:
“We have enhanced safeguards to protect our confidential information and immediately alerted law enforcement after discovering this incident. Today’s indictments are an important step towards accountability and we’ll continue working to ensure our trade secrets remain secure.”
Prior incidents involving Tensor
This is not the first time confidential Tensor information has been targeted. In 2024 an intentional leak of a slide deck revealed details about the upcoming Tensor G5 and Tensor G6 chipsets. Google later sued the leaker:
- Leak details: https://9to5google.com/2024/10/23/tensor-g5-g6-cores/
- Lawsuit: https://www.reuters.com/legal/transactional/google-sues-ex-engineer-texas-over-leaked-pixel-chip-secrets-2024-11-20/
Potential penalties
If convicted on the most serious charges, the three defendants could face “at least” 20 years in prison.
H/T Droid‑Life