OpenAI Says Apple Is Using Trade-Secret Claims to Stop a Talent Exodus

OpenAI Says Apple Is Using Trade-Secret Claims to Stop a Talent Exodus
Apple’s trade-secret fight with OpenAI is rapidly becoming a proxy battle over who gets to hire the engineers shaping the next generation of AI hardware. OpenAI says Apple is trying to litigate away a talent problem; Apple says its confidential material needs immediate protection.

The dispute began with Apple’s July lawsuit, which accused former employees who joined OpenAI of taking confidential documents for the AI company’s hardware ambitions. OpenAI has answered that the claims wrongly recast ordinary product-development material as trade secrets and that Apple did not take reasonable steps to keep it secret. In its dismissal filing, OpenAI called the allegations “meritless” and the case “rotten to its core.”

At the center of OpenAI’s defense is Chang Liu, a former Apple employee now at OpenAI. The company says his handling of files was assistance to former colleagues, not theft. It also argues Apple’s own work practices — including personal iCloud use and messages left on company devices — blurred the line between employees’ personal and corporate data. “Apple cannot transform the foreseeable consequences of its own systems and policies into evidence of theft,” OpenAI said.

Apple sees the stakes differently. On Monday, it sought a preliminary injunction that would stop OpenAI and the named employees from accessing, acquiring, using or disclosing the alleged secrets while the litigation proceeds. OpenAI’s response, published Tuesday and formalized in its Wednesday dismissal motion, was blunt: Apple should not be allowed to use a “baseless and pretextual lawsuit” to cover for failures in retaining staff and integrating AI into its products.

The rhetoric has invited outside skepticism. Elon Musk, responding to news of Apple’s injunction request and demand for forensic supervision, wrote simply: “Can’t trust OpenAI.”

The court is scheduled to hear arguments on OpenAI’s motion on October 1. If the case survives, the fight could expose sensitive details of both companies’ recruiting, data-security and hardware-development practices.

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