Notorious cases such as those involving Uber and Google, or Silicon Knights in the gaming world, reveal that not even giant companies are immune to leaks. Driven by motives ranging from personal profit, revenge, ambition, and vanity to simple naivety, leaks are often caused by employees acting in bad faith, former staff members, or hackers.
Whatever the cause, the consequences tend to be serious—and sometimes long-lasting—both for those who leaked the data and for the company itself. Below, we explore several emblematic episodes involving the leak or theft of confidential information in different industries. Did you already know any of them?
The Levandowski Case: Waymo Secrets Leak to Uber
In 2017, Google, through its Waymo division, sued Uber for stealing intellectual property related to autonomous-vehicle technology.
Before leaving Google, Levandowski copied around 14,000 confidential files, including designs and code for LiDAR sensors, a technology essential to the operation of autonomous cars. Soon after his departure, he founded Otto, a company acquired by Uber months later.
Google alleged that Uber used some of the stolen technology. The case ended in an out-of-court settlement: Uber had to pay US$245 million in shares to Waymo. Levandowski was criminally convicted in 2020, but Donald Trump pardoned him in 2021.
Apple and the Engineer Who Leaked Project Titan Secrets
"Project Titan," the internal name of Apple's supposed autonomous car, is one of the company's greatest secrets. In 2018, a former employee named Xiaolang Zhang was arrested while trying to board a flight to China with confidential information about the project.
Zhang had worked on Apple's hardware team and had direct access to sensitive documents. After announcing that he would leave the company to work for a Chinese autonomous-car startup, Apple began monitoring him and discovered that he had illegally downloaded project files and circuit designs.
The FBI was contacted, and he was arrested at San Jose airport with Apple documents on his laptop. Zhang pleaded guilty in 2022 and was ordered to pay nearly US$150,000, in addition to serving four months in prison.
Silicon Knights vs. Epic Games: Manipulation of Unreal Engine
In 2007, Silicon Knights, the Canadian studio responsible for games such as Eternal Darkness and Too Human, was accused by Epic Games of misusing Unreal Engine 3. The company had licensed the engine, but decided to copy parts of the code and create its own version, internally called the "Silicon Engine."
After years of legal disputes, the court ruled in Epic's favor. It was proven that Silicon Knights had illegally used Unreal Engine code in its games. As punishment, the studio was ordered to pay US$9.2 million in damages and destroy every game that used the modified code.
The decision dealt a fatal blow to the developer, which ceased operations in 2014. The case is remembered as one of the greatest examples of contract and intellectual-property violations in the gaming industry.
Blizzard vs. Lilith Games: The Case of Stolen Warcraft III Assets
In 2014, Blizzard sued developers Lilith Games and uCool, accusing them of using assets, animations, sound effects, and structures derived from Warcraft III code in the mobile games Soul Clash and Heroes Charge.
The complaint stated that former employees or third parties had extracted files from Warcraft III and illegally reused them in the mobile games. Forensic experts hired by Blizzard confirmed that the code files, visual effects, and sounds used in the games named in the lawsuit overlapped with those owned by Blizzard.
The case ended in a confidential settlement in 2017, but resulted in versions of the games being removed and distribution being blocked in several countries. Blizzard also updated its asset-protection practices after the episode.
Samsung vs. LG: Industrial Espionage in the Dispute Over OLED Displays
In 2012, six LG employees were suspected of stealing industrial secrets from Samsung Display, particularly information related to OLED technology used in smartphone and television screens. These employees allegedly received around US$168,000 in exchange for the confidential information.
Samsung sued LG, accusing the company of violating seven important patents and demanding millions in damages, as well as the suspension of products using those technologies. LG responded with a defamation lawsuit.
After years of investigations, South Korea's Supreme Court decided in 2022 to acquit the defendants. The court found that the technology called "Face Seal" was already publicly known from academic studies and therefore could not be considered a protected trade secret.
Meta and the Recent Leak of Confidential Information
Recently, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, faced a serious internal problem involving the leak of confidential data. According to investigations disclosed by the company, several employees were dismissed for sharing confidential information with third parties, including strategic details and internal data that could directly affect the company's business and security.
Meta determined that these leaks occurred within teams with privileged access to sensitive information. The episode shows that beyond external threats, there is also an internal risk caused by employees.
The company publicly committed to strengthening its monitoring practices and adopted disciplinary measures to prevent future incidents.
EA vs. Zynga: The Sims "Clone"
In 2012, Electronic Arts accused Zynga of copying The Sims Social when developing The Ville. In addition to visual and functional similarities, the lawsuit pointed out that several former EA employees were involved in Zynga's project and had taken internal concepts and design structures with them.
The case was settled out of court in 2013, but it generated considerable debate about the use of inside information after changing jobs and the protection of ideas, even without code being copied directly.
Carmack, ZeniMax, and the Oculus Case
Another notable case involves John Carmack, cocreator of Doom and a former employee of ZeniMax, who left the company in 2013 to work at Oculus, which was acquired by Facebook/META. ZeniMax accused him of taking confidential virtual-reality technology and documents developed while he worked there.
In 2014, the company sued Oculus for intellectual-property theft and misuse of trade secrets. During the trial, Carmack admitted that he had copied ZeniMax files, but denied that they were used in the development of Oculus Rift.
In 2017, the court partially ruled in ZeniMax's favor, awarding it US$500 million in damages. The case became one of the industry's largest involving emerging technologies and reinforced the importance of respecting contracts and intellectual property when changing companies.
