A serious case of economic espionage has emerged, involving a former Google engineer, Linwei (Leon) Ding, who is accused of stealing valuable trade secrets from the tech giant. Ding, originally from China,

The U.S. Department of Justice has accused former Google engineer Linwei Ding of leaking trade secrets to Chinese firms in an indictment.

A Chinese national working for Google in the United States faces economic espionage charges for allegedly stealing Google’s proprietary information related to AI technology, the US Department of Justice said on Feb.

Prosecutors said Leon Ding joined Google in May 2019 and began his thefts three years later, when he was being courted to join an early-stage Chinese technology company.

Linwei Ding, a former Google engineer, has been accused by US prosecutors of stealing AI trade secrets to benefit two Chinese companies. The Chinese national faces a 14-count indictment with charges of economic espionage and theft of trade secrets.