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Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

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Re: Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

#71
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you mean morally or legally? It's hard to imagine a Google engineer not knowing that sharing trade secrets is something their employer would seriously frown upon, no?

Is your allegiance to your employer above your allegiance to your country?

No and I also don’t think American companies should be employing citizens of foreign adversaries. That this is controversial shows just how naive the average American is and how unsustainable we are as a civilization these days.

Re: Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

#72

So he was already CEO/CTO of 2 China companies while still working in google. And these information are publicly available right after he registering them. Seems a management disaster of google.

Not agreeing or disagreeing, but what’s the remedy? To regularly scour sources for information on tens of thousands of employees and parse actionable meaning from the data? Maybe someone can make a horrible start-up that does this as a service.

> Not agreeing or disagreeing, but what’s the remedy? To regularly scour sources for information on tens of thousands of employees and parse actionable meaning from the data? Maybe someone can make a horrible start-up that does this as a service.

If a colleague new about it and reported it then that should lead to action 100% of the time. The question is if that happened or not.

Re: Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

#73
post #47

So he was already CEO/CTO of 2 China companies while still working in google. And these information are publicly available right after he registering them. Seems a management disaster of google.

You expect Google to scan the database of companies in every country continuously to see if employees are executives of them? How would this handle different people who have the same name? Disclosure: I work at Google.

They could try Googling it

Re: Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

#74
post #54
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A Chinese national helping his country not fall behind in what's perceived as an existential race? Wrong?

Yes, from his perspective it's likely morally right, but he was very likely aware it is illegal in the US. This nicely highlights a difficulty with globalism.

Failing to vet foreign employees working on highly sensitive projects predates globalism by a long shot. Even Manhattan Project got penetrated.

Re: Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

#75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After exfiltrating the data, he was offered a job in Chinese AI startup. Whether or not a real startup, or just s Communist party / military company is an interesting question.

Eventually tech leaders will stop hiring Chinese nationals. This keeps happening again and again.

They should already be at that point. I’m surprised it isn’t a violation of sanctions or something to have them working on cutting edge tech.

Re: Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

#77
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You expect Google to scan the database of companies in every country continuously to see if employees are executives of them? How would this handle different people who have the same name? Disclosure: I work at Google.

Not for nothing but plenty of other companies do pretty much just this, for example in defense. Surely Google of all companies should be able to do a simple search like that on a regular basis.

In highly regulated national security impacting industries like defense, that makes sense. Google has not developed that rigor yet, although it's becoming obvious that their business has high national security implications now.

Re: Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

#78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After exfiltrating the data, he was offered a job in Chinese AI startup. Whether or not a real startup, or just s Communist party / military company is an interesting question.

Eventually tech leaders will stop hiring Chinese nationals. This keeps happening again and again.

No they won’t, they’ll get hit with the dreaded “racist hiring practices” accusations. China knows this, and they exploit it. If tomorrow Google announced a ban on hiring any Russian nationals the HN comments and the media would by and large applaud such a move, by contrast.

Re: Ex-Google engineer charged with stealing trade secrets

#80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The US vastly benefit from Chinese immigration and most Chinese aren’t spies. However, it’s interesting to notice the damage one person can have, arming our most potent adversary with advanced technology. How would you quantify all this? I mean I think we're all on the same page about not wanting to reduce people to their race. That's a good sentiment. But do you have data on any of these claims? When you observe t…

> I mean I think we're all on the same page about not wanting to reduce people to their race. No we aren't. China, at any rate, isn't squeamish about using nationality and race of a person as one of the inputs into profiling them. Until China is onboard with prohibiting race profiling, everyone else who doesn't do the same is at a distinct disadvantage.

I don't understand your point here, are you arguing that you want USA to mirror China as a society and government? You do know that living in China isn't great?
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