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Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

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Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#311

Post by nl »

life_on_mars wrote: post #247
nl wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Uber is in no position to deny it, only Lewandowsky could. And he can't deny it, because then he could no longer invoke his right to remain silent. > So he should give up his 5th amendment right to fend off an accusation? I don't think so, that doesn't sound like justice to me. That's how the 5th amendment works. It gives you the right to avoid self-incrimination, but if you invoke that right and there is other ev…

Has this other evidence even been presented yet? edit: given that even a simple question was downvoted, I can only conclude that there are likely a lot of Google employees downvoting anything that doesn't support Google's side in this dispute.

Has this other evidence even been presented yet?

Yes it has - or at least enough that the judge found it compelling. I'd speculate it was something like download logs or something. From the reporting of the story I've read there doesn't seem to be anyone arguing that Lewandowsky didn't access the files. The question seems to be about if they made it to Uber.

I any case I don't think that is relevant to the question regrading the 5th amendment, and I suspect that is why you are being downvoted.

Lewandowsky and Uber's interests don't align here. It's pretty easy to see a scenario where Uber loses this case and then sues Lewandowsky.

Of course Uber wants Lewandowsky to give up his rights here. Lewandowsky has some pretty complex trade-offs to consider.

given that even a simple question was downvoted, I can only conclude that there are likely a lot of Google employees downvoting anything that doesn't support Google's side in this dispute.

I'm not sure how you figure that. I'd imagine it would be Uber employee's downvoting you, since your question really shows the big problems Uber is facing.

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#312

Post by some1else »

nstj wrote: post #285
visarga wrote: post #277

> highly functional a judge Best joke I read today.

Downvotes? Looks like there's some kind of scheme against this thread.

I think the logic used to go "Don't comment if you don't have anything to add to the discussion". So people downvote comments that should have just been upvotes in the first place.

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#313

Post by tronje »

Shinchy wrote: post #307
faitswulff wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

His middle name is Haskell :p - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Haskell_Alsup

That... is actually quite a cool name.

I'm not sure if you mean the judge's entire name or the name 'Haskell', but just in case you didn't know: Haskell (the language), as well as the functional concept of currying were both named after a mathematician called Haskell Curry :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haskell_Curry

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#314

Post by dllthomas »

tronje wrote: post #313
Shinchy wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That... is actually quite a cool name.

I'm not sure if you mean the judge's entire name or the name 'Haskell', but just in case you didn't know: Haskell (the language), as well as the functional concept of currying were both named after a mathematician called Haskell Curry :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haskell_Curry

> both named after a mathematician called Haskell Curry

... who, purportedly, hated his name :-P

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#315

Post by distances »

vidarh wrote: post #297
ChuckMcM wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What if Levandowski has the files on his home > computer or something but they never touched Uber's > system? One of the things that surprised me about Google's employee agreement was that by signing it, the employee gives permission to Google to search any and all digital devices associated with the employee whether or not they are owned by Google. When I asked an employment lawyer about it he suggested it was fai…

Yikes. Most jurisdictions I've worked a clause like that would be entirely unenforcable. In Norway, employer even have only limited rights to access things like your employer owned devices if they are personal to you, on the basis that it would be an invasion of privacy unless a lot of steps have been taken to prevent you from accessing or storing personal information on it. Though in a case like this where they have…

Similar in Finland. Employer isn't allowed to manually track any identifying data (such as IP addresses or e-mail recipients) in their own corporate networks, let alone the actual contents. In case of suspected wrongdoing, automatically collected logs can be handed over to the police for investigation.

Coming from this background the extremely lax privacy protections guaranteed for US based services are always somewhat creepy.

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#316

Post by callmeal »

ExactoKnight wrote: post #306
akiselev wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(IANAL) Imagine this was a criminal case where person A is charged with hiring person B to kill person C. Exhibit A is a forum post made by person A asking someone to assassinate person C for $15,000, exhibit B is a $15,000 check from person A to person B, and exhibit C is the gun used to kill person C, legally purchased by person A a few months ago and left at the scene of the crime with person B's fingerprints on i…

Without knowing the law, it seems like Uber could construct a viable legal defence around admitting that they inappropriately got access to these files, while simultaneously arguing that they should not face an injunction blocking work on self-driving technology, because the current technology they're developing differs significantly enough from the proprietary tech Google is trying to claim ownership over.

But it's kinda telling that they are _not_ doing that, isn't it? Just shows how badly Uber screwed up and how Waymo's evidence of theft cannot be so easily dismissed.

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#317

Post by DonHopkins »

lorenzhs wrote: post #303
ExactoKnight wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As hacker news becomes more popular it becomes more like reddit :(

"If your account is less than a year old, please don't submit comments saying that HN is turning into Reddit. It's a common semi-noob illusion, as old as the hills." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

There is one exception: If your account is exactly one year old, and a little cake icon appears next to your name, then are you allowed to submit exactly one comment saying that HN is turning into Reddit.

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#318

Post by M_Grey »

dullgiulio wrote: post #308
M_Grey wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, in hindsight I can see that's my fault... Jacob App el baum. My bad! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13891513

I have missed the connection between Appelbaum and Uber. Does he work for them now?

Good lord... I was so tired I mixed up Uber and Tor.

I'm going to bed.

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#319

Post by pawadu »

08-15 wrote: post #127

Why did Waymo sue Uber? They should have sued Levandowski---he copied (no, he didn't steal!) the files in question, after all.

They claim Levandowski's company was just a front to steal Google IP and he never intended to take that company anywhere.

Furthermore, they claim this was all orchestrated by Uber to create a legal firewall.

Re: Uber finds one allegedly stolen Waymo file on an employee’s personal device

#320

Post by KallDrexx »

filereaper wrote: post #276
Animats wrote: post #62

Judge Alsup: "If your guy is involved in criminal activity and has to have criminal lawyers of the caliber of these two gentlemen, who are the best, well, okay they got the best. But it’s a problem I can’t solve for you. And if you think I’m going to cut you some slack because you’re looking at—your guy is looking at jail time, no. They [Waymo] are going to get the benefit of their record. And if you don’t deny it—if…

I hate to piggyback on the top comment, but could somebody explain the 5th Amendment and its implications here. I'm not a lawyer, nor am I from the USA. I've heard of the fifth, but never fully understood it in scenarios like this.

When you are being questioned by authorities, even if you are 100% clear/not guilty in the matter the simple fact of the matter is that it is very unlikely that you will be 100% accurate in your testimony to the authorities. Little details (even when correct) can be twisted by the authorities who have an incentive to get a conviction. So the fifth amendment was created to give legal protection to individuals who do not wish to testify or talk with authorities themselves and allow them to utilize an impartial 3rd party lawyer to manage the conversation flow.

A jury in a criminal case is not supposed to hold any weight to someone taking a fifth amendment plea to not talk (since it's a provision really meant to protect the innocent) but with human nature that's unfortunately not the case.

However, since this is a civil case I don't know if the legal system has to be neutral in a Fifth amendment plea. If not that would help Waymo's case, especially since Waymo does have evidence that he downloaded these documents. So Him taking the fifth is just to make sure he doesn't do anything himself that will spawn a criminal conviction later.

(IANAL)

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