Ismail J. Ramsey, U.S. Attorney | U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California
A federal grand jury has issued a superseding indictment against Linwei Ding, also known as Leon Ding, charging him with seven counts of economic espionage and seven counts of theft of trade secrets. The charges relate to an alleged plan to steal proprietary artificial intelligence technology from Google LLC.
Initially indicted in March 2024 on four counts of theft of trade secrets, the new indictment outlines seven categories of trade secrets allegedly stolen by Ding. He is accused of uploading over 1,000 unique files containing Google's confidential information to his personal Google Cloud account between May 2022 and May 2023.
Ding joined Google as a software engineer in 2019. While employed there, he reportedly affiliated himself with two technology companies based in the People's Republic of China (PRC). By June 2022, he was negotiating to become Chief Technology Officer for one company and later founded his own AI-focused company in the PRC, serving as its CEO by May 2023.
The indictment claims that Ding aimed to benefit the PRC government through these actions. It alleges that he stole technology related to Google's supercomputing data center infrastructure and software platform used for training large AI models. The stolen trade secrets include details about Google's Tensor Processing Unit chips and systems, GPU systems, communication software, and custom-designed SmartNICs used in cloud networking products.
Furthermore, it is alleged that Ding circulated presentations among employees at his company citing PRC national policies supporting domestic AI industry development. He also applied to a PRC talent program with claims that his company's product would elevate China's computing power infrastructure capabilities.
United States Attorney Ismail J. Ramsey and FBI Acting Special Agent in Charge Dan Costin announced the indictment. They emphasized that an indictment only alleges crimes have been committed and all defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
If convicted, Ding could face up to 10 years in prison for each count under 18 U.S.C. § 1832 and up to 15 years for each count under 18 U.S.C § 1831. Sentencing would be determined according to U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and relevant federal statutes.
The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Casey Boome and Molly K. Priedeman along with Trial Attorneys Stephen Marzen and Yifei Zheng from the National Security Division’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section following an FBI investigation.
This action is part of efforts coordinated through the Justice and Commerce Departments’ Disruptive Technology Strike Force—a collaboration designed to counter illicit activities targeting critical technologies.
