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Alphabet's Waymo Alleges Uber Stole Self-Driving Secrets

907 points by coloneltcb 10y ago

donjh 10y ago
And Google Ventures is an Uber investor... so Google is effectively suing one of their own portfolio companies.
- neom 10y ago
  GV is generally very arms length of google itself, in fact when I've pitched them they specifically say as much. They'll make investments that are supportive to the google mission generally, and sometimes that investment is a hedge I would imagine.
  - argonaut 10y ago
    To add on to this, the existence of other Google investing arms makes me more believing of the claim that Google Ventures is firewalled from Google corporate; it seems Google needs Google Capital (and Google corp which also directly invests sometimes) because they can't tell Google Ventures to invest in certain companies even if they would like to for strategic reasons.
- twblalock 10y ago
  Companies sue other companies they have relationships with fairly often. For example, Samsung is still a hardware supplier to Apple, so Apple is suing its own supplier in the Apple v. Samsung case.
  - dba7dba 10y ago
    And not to mention other Samsung subsidiaries (that make display, RAM, CPU) were probably crying bloody murder to Samsung Handphone division...
- pgroves 10y ago
  ...and is the second investor today to turn on Uber.
- mshenfield 10y ago
  7% share according to this article https://www.recode.net/2015/12/6/11621176/google-ventures-owns-part-of-several-unicorns-but-the-biggest-and https://www.recode.net/2015/12/6/11621176/google-ventures-ow...
  - webXL 10y ago
    "So let's sue them, but.... it wouldn't be all that terrible if we lost."
powera 10y ago
Patents, or Trade Secrets?
- lojack 10y ago
  My guess would be trade secrets since patents would be public information and afaik the technology isn't currently being sold this wouldn't be subject to patent infringement laws. Not a lawyer though, so I could be wrong.
- rrdharan 10y ago
  Misappropriating trade secrets and infringing on patents, as per the Waymo blogpost: https://medium.com/waymo/a-note-on-our-lawsuit-against-otto-and-uber-86f4f98902a1#.c48mb4c3b https://medium.com/waymo/a-note-on-our-lawsuit-against-otto-...
chollida1 10y ago
From another source to provide some colour: > According to a lawsuit filed today in federal court in California, Waymo accuses Anthony Levandowski, an engineer who left Google to found Otto and now serves as a top ranking Uber executive, stole 14,000 highly confidential documents from Google before departing to start his own company. Among the documents were schematics of a circuit board and details about radar and LIDAR technology, Waymo says > The lawsuit claims that a team of ex-Google engineers used critical technology, including the Lidar laser sensors, in the autonomous trucking startup they founded, and which Uber later acquired I was confused as to what stealing a patent actually meant:) Waymo has also posted this.... https://medium.com/@waymo/a-note-on-our-lawsuit-against-otto-and-uber-86f4f98902a1#.mn83yyh0t https://medium.com/@waymo/a-note-on-our-lawsuit-against-otto... From this post... > Recently, we received an unexpected email. One of our suppliers specializing in LiDAR components sent us an attachment (apparently inadvertently) of machine drawings of what was purported to be Uber’s LiDAR circuit board — except its design bore a striking resemblance to Waymo’s unique LiDAR design. > We found that six weeks before his resignation this former employee, Anthony Levandowski, downloaded over 14,000 highly confidential and proprietary design files for Waymo’s various hardware systems, including designs of Waymo’s LiDAR and circuit board. To gain access to Waymo’s design server, Mr. Levandowski searched for and installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop. Once inside, he downloaded 9.7 GB of Waymo’s highly confidential files and trade secrets, including blueprints, design files and testing documentation. Then he connected an external drive to the laptop. Mr. Levandowski then wiped and reformatted the laptop in an attempt to erase forensic fingerprints. Ooops, that does sound bad after a first read.
- ocdtrekkie 10y ago
  It's kind amazing that Google keeps reiterating how their incredible security protects your data, and that even employees are extremely carefully monitored. Yet their confidential trade secrets were taken by a dude who seemingly didn't have access to them as part of his job (since he had to go install the software) and a portable hard drive. The post also says he talked about replicating their technology at a competitor with colleagues months before he actually stole the data too. Generally if you work on something confidential, and you start talking about taking it elsewhere, someone reports it or something. Sidebar question if there are any armchair lawyers around: While I expect Uber to lose this lawsuit based on the type of evidence being claimed here, is it also possible for Uber to sue the supplier for leaking their confidential data back to Google? Because that seems like an incredible lapse of confidentiality in itself. Or will the notion that it wasn't legitimately their confidential data in the end, make Uber's own claim void?
Fricken 10y ago
In related news, Tesla is accusing ex-autopilot director Sterling Anderson of stealing code from Tesla before starting up Aurora with Chris Urmson (the former CTO of Alphabet's self driving car program): https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/26/tesla-sues-ex-autopilot-director-for-taking-proprietary-info-poaching-employees/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/26/tesla-sues-ex-autopilot-di...
jplayer01 10y ago
I always was incredibly surprised at how quickly Uber had working self-driving cars (with the required, highly specialized hardware). Guess this explains it.
- tyingq 10y ago
  Uber acquired Otto around 08/2016. I don't think this explains it.
  - amaks 10y ago
    Who knows maybe they had somebody else from the Google self driving car project to steal self-driving car secrets earlier. Based on what this Levandowski guy did the industrial espionage may go unnoticed. I'm wondering if Waymo will require Uber to reveal schematics of their self-driving car project as part of the law suite.
    - tyingq 10y ago
      I have doubts what was stolen was actually any of the secret sauce. An interface board for a lidar unit is probably one of the most simple things on the list. The actual self driving software, and more importantly, all of the collected data from the waymo fleet would have been the key.
      - makomk 10y ago
        Not so much an interface board as a whole new tested design for a LIDAR unit, including a unique patented optics setup and laser driver circuit, according to the complaint. Also testing, manufacturing, and characterization procedures and results and information on suppliers for the parts required. The PCB was just the component whose accidental disclosure lead them to conclude that Uber and Otto were using the stolen design. Since the PCB apparently dictates the position and orientation of the laser diodes and sensors, presumably it would only be useful if they copied the whole thing.
        10y ago
fasteddie 10y ago
Maybe I have a selective memory as a former Zynga employee, but generally these "stolen documents" lawsuits in high profile tech companies have generally turned out to be pretty factual. Easy to prove, and hard to fake.
- icelancer 10y ago
  And lawsuits like this generally don't get filed unless it's near slam-dunk considering the burden of proof is high on stolen electronic documents.
  - Kostchei 10y ago
    Considering even with logging off: journaling file systems, "user assist", device connection logs, pre-fetch (or your OS's equivalent)- these are all huge tranches of data if you are looking at a system shortly after an event. Ask me 6 months later- probably not. Give me a system that hasn't even rebooted, has a heap of ram and hasn't been used much since- 6 weeks is fine, not ideal, but doable.
    - valleyer 10y ago
      Journaling filesystems don't "journal" all the activity in perpetuity. They typically just journal the changes until they're committed to disk, usually for less than a second. See http://www.nobius.org/~dbg/practical-file-system-design.pdf http://www.nobius.org/~dbg/practical-file-system-design.pdf, section 7.2 "How Does Journaling Work?".
ww520 10y ago
How can you steal patents? Those are public info. Infringing on patents?
- alex_young 10y ago
  "Patent application nonpublication request"
- praneshp 10y ago
  The title is "Alphabet's Waymo Alleges Uber Stole Self-Driving Secrets". I hope the mods can change the HN article's to that.
- the_watcher 10y ago
  Yea, the title here is off. The lawsuit is over stealing secrets, not patents. Patented information is involved, it seems.
glibgil 10y ago
> searched for and installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop That could mean he downloaded an SFTP client like Cyberduck. He could have searched the internet for a client and then installed it. It doesn't say he did not have auth. Imagine a Google security engineer being deposed for this lawsuit. Lawyer: "Show me on the MacBook how he downloaded the files" Engineer: "Well, he used Cyberduck" Lawyer: "Is that part of the Mac?" Engineer: "No, he'd have to download it separately" Lawyer: "So, he searched for and installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop?" Engineer: "Um, sure" Lawyer: "Thank you, that's all the questions I had"
- ocdtrekkie 10y ago
  This is true, but it doesn't negate the issue. If you need some sort of client to gain access to the design server, and he didn't already have it, it very likely means that he didn't work on those files normally, and hence, really probably shouldn't have had access to them. He may not have installed "hacking tools" or anything like that, but he did specifically take action to access files he didn't normally use as part of his job. Which is, I think, all that this post is claiming.
- Kostchei 10y ago
  It could also be a e-discovery tool like Nuix. If you want to find all documents containing X amongst millions of docs- that's the sort of tool I would use (work in computer forensics) *edit. And 9.7 GB of data, assuming it's docs not "just' a lot of CAD is a lot of docs..
- msbarnett 10y ago
  > That could mean he downloaded an SFTP client like Cyberduck. He could have searched the internet for a client and then installed it. It doesn't say he did not have auth. They weren't trying to claim he hacked in. They're making the case he went out of his way to get his hands on these documents, and building a timeline that suggests why he went to that trouble.
amaks 10y ago
Things couldn't be worse for Uber these days. Sexual harassment scandal, Didi Chuxing plans for global expansion, now this lawsuit.
the_watcher 10y ago
Minor fix: Waymo is suing for stealing secrets, not patents. As far as I know, it's not actually possible to steal a patent.
- lindowe 10y ago
  Infringement of patents (the ’273 patent, entitled “Microrod Compression of Laser Beam in Combination with Transmit Lens")
  - ssambros 10y ago
    Infringement, yes, but how can you 'steal' a patent?
    - the_watcher 10y ago
      That was exactly my point. Patents are definitionally impossible to steal (unless, I guess, you somehow are able to get access to the patent database and change the patent holder?)
  - Animats 10y ago
    That's not a very interesting patent. It's basically some optical stuff to do LIDAR scanning with non-square pixels, presumably because you want more resolution in one axis than the other. That's nice, but not a big improvement over existing technology.
praneshp 10y ago
Could a mod change the title to "Alphabet's Waymo Alleges Uber Stole Self-Driving Secrets", which is what the Bloomberg article says (for now)?
- grzm 10y ago
  To expedite this, you may want to email the mods directly via the Contact link in the footer.
danjoc 10y ago
There's something very wrong in the world when the people who invent things aren't the main beneficiary of their own inventions. Edit: A guy downloads 9.7GB of other people's work, walks off with it, and sells it. Flushing years of work from hundreds of engineers down the toilet. You down voters really support that? Amazing.
- the_economist 10y ago
  I imagine that throughout human history this has been the case far often than not.
- untilHellbanned 10y ago
  Otto was a YC company so there's your answer. People condone a lot of awful if they 1) make money off it; 2) Have some emotional connection to it
  - danjoc 10y ago
    I wasn't aware of that. Thank you for risking down votes to bring that to light.
    - justin 10y ago
      It's untrue. Otto was not a YC company.
  - changdizzle 10y ago
    As far as I know Otto wasn't YC - are you sure you're not thinking of Cruise (which was acquired by GM)?
    - CardenB 10y ago
      He could be thinking of starsky robotics
  - justin 10y ago
    This not true. Why would you spread this lie?
sriram_sun 10y ago
What kind of employee would download 14K files to a personal drive right before quitting? It is trivially easy to watch what files get copied over to external drives. I think you can follow the money trail here and find some answers for sure. Now if Uber/Otto has a clause that prohibits employees from bringing in confidential data from previous companies, how can they be held liable? Does Google have to prove that those stolen documents were actually used in Uber designs?
- dba7dba 10y ago
  A supplier of Google received the file from Uber and that supplier forwarded it to Google. This means the file was sent out by Uber to a supplier to try to get parts made. I think that's proof enough. Btw that's 1 very sharp eyed engineer, whoever that is...
  - MertsA 10y ago
    >Btw that's 1 very sharp eyed engineer, whoever that is... It sounds like this was entirely accidental on the supplier's part.
- jonstewart 10y ago
  We call them "bad leavers" in the forensics industry. There are enough of them to keep us in business.
aramadia 10y ago
Direct link to the complaint: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
aramadia 10y ago
Direct link to the complaint: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...
croddin 10y ago
It looks like bloomberg updated the title to: "Alphabet's Waymo Alleges Uber Stole Self-Driving Secrets", which makes more sense. We should change the title here.
Animats 10y ago
Google might have been better off with patents than trade secrets. There are financial penalties for theft of trade secrets, but once the secret is out, no injunctions. The one who stole it can use it. With patents, injunctions are available, although hard to get. Anyway, several companies are developing automotive LIDAR units which are better than Google's rotating things. Quantergy and Velodyne claim to be close to low-cost solid state LIDARs, and ASC has good ones now at a high price point. (An ASC unit just docked the Dragon spacecraft with the ISS.) By the time this gets to court, Google's secret technology will be obsolete. The question is whether Uber will defend Levandowski or leave him to twist slowly, slowly in the wind and go to jail.
- revelation 10y ago
  I doubt there is any hot technology in some LIDAR interface board in the first place.
  - Animats 10y ago
    There's a lot to be done at the semiconductor level for solid state LIDAR. The ASC units work great, but the sensor requires an InGaAs fab, like night vision sensors, to get good light sensitivity and thus range. Others are talking about getting good performance with a sensor that can be made in a CMOS fab, but nobody is shipping yet. This is an area where Waymo has a strong interest, even if they're not making the sensors themselves.
  - jonstewart 10y ago
    Probably no way to improve TCP bandwidth either...
  - MertsA 10y ago
    The board isn't the interesting bit, the board just shows that Otto was using Waymo's design. This also isn't what they're suing over, this was just the tip off they needed to figure out that the ex-employee stole data on the way out the door.
mylons 10y ago
uber is a DUMPSTER FIRE right now. feel bad for the engineers there who didn't steal anything.
gumby 10y ago
dang: just like we have warnings for [video] and [pdf] could we have warnings for autoplay video? I accidentally had the sound enabled on my computer.
w00tw00tw00t 10y ago
I had an interview there where the manager asked me to leave my laptop behind and go for a walk. I was hesitant after hearing stories of Uber conducting electronic espionage against its competitors. They could easily bypass Macbook security with a USB device (I had heard of that on HN too) so I was very nervous to leave my laptop behind and noted its exact orientation and position on the table. Sure enough when I returned my laptop had changed both position and orientation, but only enough to tell if you had specifically memorized it. I could be paranoid. They could have simply moved things on the desk. But anyway, people who are paranoid like me are advised not to take their laptops into Uber interviews. They are capable of just about anything, or so thinks my now paranoid self.
- fuzzythinker 10y ago
  Thanks for the info. Will know not leave my laptop behind in any interviews.
  - cmyr 10y ago
    A better strategy is just to not interview at uber.
  - tomjakubowski 10y ago
    I've never felt the need to bring my own laptop to a job interview. If the company asked me to bring my own, I'd consider that strange or even suspicious.
    - whorleater 10y ago
      It'd be really weird for them to request you to bring a laptop, but sometimes when a company flies you out for an onsite and your return flight is that night, your options are either 1) leave your laptop with the hotel as luggage (pretty bad) or 2) bring your laptop to the interview. There's no real reason for them to know you have your laptop with you however.
      - 10y ago
huangc10 10y ago
> Alphabet’s venture capital arm, GV -- formerly known as Google Ventures -- is an early backer of Uber. Correct me if I am wrong, but does that mean Alphabet is suing itself since Alphabet owns both Google Venture, Waymo and has an investment in Uber...?
- kyleschiller 10y ago
  Yeah, that's wrong, being an investor in a company doesn't make you liable for their actions. It does mean that Alphabet stands to lose something if they win the lawsuit, though whatever stake they do have in Uber is obviously negligible compared to WayMo itself.
james_niro 10y ago
I need popcorn and front row seat for this
lsh123 10y ago
Google was on the other side before: https://techcrunch.com/2011/05/26/paypal-lawsuit-google/ https://techcrunch.com/2011/05/26/paypal-lawsuit-google/
- zaatar 10y ago
  What was the outcome of this lawsuit?
  - lsh123 10y ago
    Was curious too, can't find it anywhere.
dkarapetyan 10y ago
This is a little idiotic. Alphabet let all their talent walk out the door. I'm assuming mostly because of idiotic management and now they're suing. They're basically losing on all sides.
giis 10y ago
Interesting questions for google employees: Does Google force you to use specific version of OS? Do they have pre-installed software? Is it not-okay to format and install any OS you want? I work in startups, they provide only laptops and doesnt care about OS or software. There is no mandatory software requirement from company side.
- CardenB 10y ago
  Yes, they have Goobuntu. Believe so. No it isn't. Lastly, you have to ssh into a workstation to access any files and you aren't allowed to have files downloaded locally for this exact reason. He would have had to have gone through some trouble to even obtain these files locally I would imagine.
- ocdtrekkie 10y ago
  My understanding is that Google has users on Linux, Mac, and Windows, and has resources for managing all of them. As the other commenter points out, Goobuntu is a custom distro of Ubuntu that Googlers use. I do recall hearing people tended to need a justification for needing Windows, but I'm pretty sure OS X users are common.
- QuercusMax 10y ago
  For eng workstations, virtually all are Goobuntu unless you have a reallllly good reason (e.g. CAD software for mech e's, or work on Windows Chrome). For laptops, they're essentially just used as a dumb web terminal + ssh. You can get mac, goobuntu, or maybe even Windows. Since you aren't allowed to have source code on laptops (except certain special exceptions), it's not as big of a concern.
  - valleyer 10y ago
    You aren't allowed to have source on your laptop? How do you edit it? Through some web editor? Serious question!
    - UncleMeat 10y ago
dnautics 10y ago
Is the HN headline correct? The bloomberg article says "trade secrets" which are very different from patents, the video also says that this is not primarily a patent case. edit: 0:48 in the video
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
bitL 10y ago
This is going to be interesting to watch. Alphabet just: - went nuclear on Uber/Otto - revealed what they track internally to all their employees
- morecoffee 10y ago
  Google employees are probably aware they are being tracked. Keeping such a thing a secret would likely result in more leaks, not fewer.
  - delroth 10y ago
    Not only is it very well known internally, Google has even open sourced some of the tools that are used for that purpose: https://github.com/google/grr https://github.com/google/grr
    - bitL 10y ago
      Still, how can they work in a basically zero trust environment? They can't hope anyone reasonable will come up with some great idea and willingly share it with them.
- marricks 10y ago
  I think it's reasonable to be suspicious but what they described sounds mostly feasible without extra steps of tracking. What evidence did they present and how could it be tracked? - downloaded 9.7 GB of waymo data -> server logs of what files where accessed and downloaded by what user - searched for special software -> he used google while logged into a work account, so they just looked up that work accounts search history - Connected external hard drive and wiped data -> Short of automatic backups or something this seems like there is software explicitly for tracking when data is copied, where, and how much Most of this besides the external hard drive part can be done by any employer who owns your work your gmail account. What really should be alarming is how easy it is for your employer to get lots of data on you even if they aren't some tech giant.
  - 10y ago
dba7dba 10y ago
So a junior engineer took the files, left Waymo to join Uber and tried to pass off the files? Correction. So he's not really a junior engineer. But how can he not think that everything he access on the Google's network is monitored?
- guelo 10y ago
  "now serves as a top ranking Uber executive"
  - dba7dba 10y ago
    Lol, yeah my bad. My God. What a waste of talent of him, and waste of time/energy for everyone involved. I wonder if Uber accepted the stolen files from Google knowing they were stolen.
- hluska 10y ago
  Not quite... First, Levandowski is far from a junior engineer. He's been described as the tech lead at Waymo and worked on Google Maps and Streetview. Second, he left Waymo to co-found Otto, a startup which existed for six months before Uber acquired it for several hundred million dollars. Third, he's now described as a senior executive at Uber. I'm not sure where Facebook comes from here. Did I miss something??
  - dba7dba 10y ago
    Yes, yes. One must not comment on HN while coding (simple stuff) and eating snack, and telling kids to do their homework. I work from home today. My apologies...
    - hluska 10y ago
      Don't worry bud and thanks for your reply!! I knew there was a 50% chance that I was severely confused and I appreciate you taking the time to clarify.
- dang 10y ago
guelo 10y ago
Wow this has got to be the worse single month for a company that I've ever seen.
- megablast 10y ago
  So you've never heard of Enron?
- _audakel 10y ago
  Or Microsoft antitrust?
  - edblarney 10y ago
    Please - Microsoft antitrust was nothing like this. Microsoft was basically extremely successful - and then became a monopoly provider. In general, I wouldn't call this an 'immoral act' or whatever. Also - I'd suggest that Google is just as much a Monopoly provider as MS ever was, they could face the same type of case in EU soon. Stealing IP, lying, corruption - this is in a whole different league from being so successful that you become a monopoly.
  - filthee 10y ago
    Or Samsung
jfoster 10y ago
> Recently, we received an unexpected email. One of our suppliers specializing in LiDAR components sent us an attachment (apparently inadvertently) of machine drawings of what was purported to be Uber’s LiDAR circuit board — except its design bore a striking resemblance to Waymo’s unique LiDAR design. Doesn't sound plausible. At a minimum, this would have to be the "dumbed down" version of how they uncovered this.
twinkletwinkle 10y ago
Interesting. I vividly remember a commenter here on a thread about Uber's acquisition of Otto. The user said based on the timeline and filings, it seemed like Otto hadn't really accomplished anything yet, and was probably founded purely to be acquired by Uber. I wonder if there's even more here...
golfer 10y ago
Does anyone else remember this New Yorker profile [1] of Anthony Levandowski and self driving cars? Way back from 2013, when this tech was still novel. Google let Levandowski run the show for this piece -- his name is mentioned 57 times in the article. Goes to show how important and trusted he was in Google's universe. [1] http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/11/25/auto-correct http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/11/25/auto-correct
- cpeterso 10y ago
  Anthony Levandowski was targeted back in 2014 by protesters against Google's military work with Boston Dynamics. https://arstechnica.com/business/2014/01/protestors-show-up-at-the-doorstep-of-google-self-driving-car-engineer/ https://arstechnica.com/business/2014/01/protestors-show-up-... http://www.berkeleyside.com/2014/01/22/activists-target-google-employee-berkeley-resident/ http://www.berkeleyside.com/2014/01/22/activists-target-goog...
- Animats 10y ago
  Sure. I met him when he was still a student at UC Berkeley. He was the one who built the self-driving, self-balancing motorcycle for the 2005 DARPA Grand Challenge. It didn't navigate that well or get all that far, but it was really cool.
Fricken 10y ago
Presumably you're in Arizona at the moment, Mr. Levandowski, it's close to the border, run for it! We'll take a moment to remember the salad days, when you were just a crazy college kid who showed up at the Darpa Grand Challenge with a self driving motorcycle: https://youtu.be/XOgkNh_IPjU https://youtu.be/XOgkNh_IPjU
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
selftemp 10y ago
Copy-pasting from my comment on Reddit. The first thing that caught my attention after reading the whole lawsuit! https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k... [Item 42- 49] itself is some of the timings regarding Otto's inception and Uber's acquisition. Timeline: * Levandowski first registered the domain for his then(now Otto) company on Nov'15 * The suit says on 3rd of Dec'15 he searched for the LIDAR docs and on 11th of Dec'15, he downloaded 14,000 docs from Google's servers. * Google alleges that on Jan'16, Levandowski told his colleagues that he plans to replicate the Waymo tech at one of Waymo's competitor. * One of the damning allegation from Waymo is that he met with top execs at Uber at their HQ in SF on Jan 14th 2016. * Just a day later on 15th he officially formed one of his company(280 Systems, now part of Otto), later on Feb 1st he also registered his other company(Otto Trucking) Feb 1st. * Strangely after working at Google for about 7 years, he quit Google without a notice(from suit) on Jan 27th. This is from the interview Bloomberg's did after Uber acquired Otto: 'Kalanick began courting Levandowski this spring, broaching the possibility of an acquisition during a series of 10-mile night walks from the Soma neighborhood where Uber is also headquartered to the Golden Gate Bridge. The two men would leave their offices separately—to avoid being seen by employees, the press, or competitors. They’d grab takeout food, then rendezvous near the city’s Ferry Building. Levandowski says he saw a union as a way to bring the company’s trucks to market faster.' From the above details, it can imply any of these three things might have happened, * Scenario 1: He or Uber didn't do anything different from the official story so far. * Scenario 2: Levandowski went to Uber saying he has custom LIDAR tech but ended up starting his own company the next day and 8 months later Uber just bought them for $680M for the team and tech he alleged stole from Waymo. * Scenario 3: Levandowski went to Uber in Jan'16, said he has the tech for custom LIDAR, Uber wants it, but there is non-suspicious way for taking the tech directly to Uber since Levandowski alone can't build it. Instead Uber suggests to spin off his own company, hire a team (mostly from Waymo), put together a demo in Nevada desert. This brings in all the press and validity that Otto has the self-driving tech and team. So at this point Otto and Levandowski is a Self-driving tech startup not a LIDAR startup. Now Uber can come in, acquire this hot startup and team, in a market that's worth Trillions. Now Uber is suddenly in the trucking business, gets a huge PR and valuation bump. In this process they also get the LIDAR tech that's build in just 9 months. What it means is that if the 3rd theory is true, Uber was always buying the LIDAR tech from Levandowski even before he left Waymo. Otto and other components are just a proxy so that it gives them a great story without any suspicions. To put things into perspective, a single Velodyne HDL-64E LIDAR that almost all self-driving companies use costs around $75,000. Waymo says their equivalent custom alternative costs less than 10% (<$7000). This is a huge cost saving for a tech that is going to go in 100,000+ cars Uber hopes to have in the market in the future. So yea, this can be a bullshit Lawsuit (based on the evidence, less likely) or a well executed corporate espionage!
monktastic1 10y ago
His favorite quote: "I drink your milkshake." Wish I were kidding.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
sebleon 10y ago
Seems like Google/Waymo has known about this for a while, funny how they timed this lawsuit announcement during the Fowler blog post uproar
- equalarrow 10y ago
  Yup, timing is everything. For press.. I doubt tho, this will affect the lawsuit.
seesomesense 10y ago
Sounds a bit like the Aleynikov saga.. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-24/aleynikov-s-conviction-is-reinstated-by-state-appeals-court https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-24/aleynikov...
KKKKkkkk1 10y ago
It's sad how G lost its top engineers and is now trying to get back at them in the courts.
jpeg_hero 10y ago
Lots of Juice here. Complaint: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k... >Waymo was recently – and apparently inadvertently – copied on an email from one of its LiDAR component vendors. Is this going to be a legal test of that annoying lawyer email footer language? >This message contains information from xxxxxx that may be confidential and privileged. If you are not an intended recipient, please refrain from any disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of this information and note that such actions are prohibited. If you have received this information in error, please notify the sender immediately by telephone or by replying to this transmission. Ha! More legalese BS that never holds up. > Otto launched publicly in May 2016, and was quickly acquired by Uber in August 2016 for $680 million. The fact pattern here is going to be absolutely brutal for Uber. A non-technical judge is going to see the allegation: ex-google employee downloads technical documents in December 2015, launches a company 5 months later in May 2016, and is bought for $680M (later speculated to be $1B+) for all its technical accomplishments. How much fundamental research did they do in the 3 months between May-16 and August-16?!?!? Or was it just to buy the stolen IP that google had developed over 7 years?!? Brutal for Uber! -- A public company recently settled a similar lawsuit (competitor hires exec, exec is proven to have downloaded documents) for $130M on much smaller numbers. And the defendant was run through the legal wringer first. http://www.geekwire.com/2016/zillow-realtor-com-operator-move-move-reach/ http://www.geekwire.com/2016/zillow-realtor-com-operator-mov... Expect Uber spankage, bigly. > shortly after Mr. Levandowski received his final multi-million dollar payment from Google Funny because of all the recent press that Google paid autonomous driving talent too much that they left! >Infringement of Patent No. 9,368,936 (Against All Defendants) Real nasty. If a trade secrets lawsuit is an arrow, throwing in a patent infringement claim too, is poison tipped and barbed! This is some good "old skool Google" where they used to show broad competence across many domains; in this case legal.
sriram_sun 10y ago
The medium article also notes that a couple more employees stole confidential information. Five years later Waymo employees will be bitching and moaning about corporate overreach and will have these fucktards to thank. (If allegations are proved).
tlrobinson 10y ago
Well, that would help explain how Otto went from nothing to $680 million acquisition in ~7 months.
home_boi 10y ago
Despite the damning alleged evidence, I get the feeling that all the offenders knew that they would be found out ahead of time, evaluated the risk reward trade-off and decided that they could somehow get away with it. Are there any lawyers here who could make an educated guess how they could?
- bmon 10y ago
  Well a good start would be using a different supplier than Waymo.
zump 10y ago
Anyone here would do the same thing.
- bmon 10y ago
  Maybe you might, but if you give me the choice of being in jail or not, I think I'd rather keep my windows unbarred.
  - zump 10y ago
    He's not going to jail, he's white.
    - dang 10y ago
      We've banned this account for posting unsubstantive comments and ignoring repeated requests to stop. If you don't want it to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and promise to follow the rules in the future.
dantiberian 10y ago
A really critical thing that hasn't got much attention is that shortly before leaving Waymo, Levandowski had a meeting with senior Uber execs(!). The day after the meeting, he formed 280 Systems which became Otto. The implication in the filing is that Uber planned this with Levandowski, and he only created Otto as a plausible corporate vehicle for developing the LiDAR technology before Uber acquired them. Given what we know about Uber and the assertions in the complaint, this sounds entirely plausible, maybe even likely. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...
- fullshark 10y ago
  Paragraph 48 if anyone is wondering.
samfisher83 10y ago
Google has shares in uber. If they sue them and win their shares are theoretically worth less. I guess if they win enough money it works out.
brilliantcode 10y ago
This will put a permanent blow to Uber, it's in a tight spot already and self driving cars are it's only chance of survival. If there's anyway to short Uber or any of the other unicorns kept afloat by low interest venture capital, please let me know.
lexap 10y ago
The timing here is just way too coincidental. Coming at a fresh nadir in Uber's standing in the tech industry, the week after Fowler's post. For how long did Google know Levandowski had swiped its secrets? This is how PR war is waged.

907 points by coloneltcb 10y ago

donjh 10y ago

And Google Ventures is an Uber investor... so Google is effectively suing one of their own portfolio companies.

neom 10y ago
GV is generally very arms length of google itself, in fact when I've pitched them they specifically say as much. They'll make investments that are supportive to the google mission generally, and sometimes that investment is a hedge I would imagine.
- argonaut 10y ago
  To add on to this, the existence of other Google investing arms makes me more believing of the claim that Google Ventures is firewalled from Google corporate; it seems Google needs Google Capital (and Google corp which also directly invests sometimes) because they can't tell Google Ventures to invest in certain companies even if they would like to for strategic reasons.
twblalock 10y ago
Companies sue other companies they have relationships with fairly often. For example, Samsung is still a hardware supplier to Apple, so Apple is suing its own supplier in the Apple v. Samsung case.
- dba7dba 10y ago
  And not to mention other Samsung subsidiaries (that make display, RAM, CPU) were probably crying bloody murder to Samsung Handphone division...
pgroves 10y ago
...and is the second investor today to turn on Uber.
mshenfield 10y ago
7% share according to this article https://www.recode.net/2015/12/6/11621176/google-ventures-owns-part-of-several-unicorns-but-the-biggest-and https://www.recode.net/2015/12/6/11621176/google-ventures-ow...
- webXL 10y ago
  "So let's sue them, but.... it wouldn't be all that terrible if we lost."

powera 10y ago

Patents, or Trade Secrets?

lojack 10y ago
My guess would be trade secrets since patents would be public information and afaik the technology isn't currently being sold this wouldn't be subject to patent infringement laws. Not a lawyer though, so I could be wrong.
rrdharan 10y ago
Misappropriating trade secrets and infringing on patents, as per the Waymo blogpost: https://medium.com/waymo/a-note-on-our-lawsuit-against-otto-and-uber-86f4f98902a1#.c48mb4c3b https://medium.com/waymo/a-note-on-our-lawsuit-against-otto-...

chollida1 10y ago

From another source to provide some colour: > According to a lawsuit filed today in federal court in California, Waymo accuses Anthony Levandowski, an engineer who left Google to found Otto and now serves as a top ranking Uber executive, stole 14,000 highly confidential documents from Google before departing to start his own company. Among the documents were schematics of a circuit board and details about radar and LIDAR technology, Waymo says > The lawsuit claims that a team of ex-Google engineers used critical technology, including the Lidar laser sensors, in the autonomous trucking startup they founded, and which Uber later acquired I was confused as to what stealing a patent actually meant:) Waymo has also posted this.... https://medium.com/@waymo/a-note-on-our-lawsuit-against-otto-and-uber-86f4f98902a1#.mn83yyh0t https://medium.com/@waymo/a-note-on-our-lawsuit-against-otto... From this post... > Recently, we received an unexpected email. One of our suppliers specializing in LiDAR components sent us an attachment (apparently inadvertently) of machine drawings of what was purported to be Uber’s LiDAR circuit board — except its design bore a striking resemblance to Waymo’s unique LiDAR design. > We found that six weeks before his resignation this former employee, Anthony Levandowski, downloaded over 14,000 highly confidential and proprietary design files for Waymo’s various hardware systems, including designs of Waymo’s LiDAR and circuit board. To gain access to Waymo’s design server, Mr. Levandowski searched for and installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop. Once inside, he downloaded 9.7 GB of Waymo’s highly confidential files and trade secrets, including blueprints, design files and testing documentation. Then he connected an external drive to the laptop. Mr. Levandowski then wiped and reformatted the laptop in an attempt to erase forensic fingerprints. Ooops, that does sound bad after a first read.

ocdtrekkie 10y ago
It's kind amazing that Google keeps reiterating how their incredible security protects your data, and that even employees are extremely carefully monitored. Yet their confidential trade secrets were taken by a dude who seemingly didn't have access to them as part of his job (since he had to go install the software) and a portable hard drive. The post also says he talked about replicating their technology at a competitor with colleagues months before he actually stole the data too. Generally if you work on something confidential, and you start talking about taking it elsewhere, someone reports it or something. Sidebar question if there are any armchair lawyers around: While I expect Uber to lose this lawsuit based on the type of evidence being claimed here, is it also possible for Uber to sue the supplier for leaking their confidential data back to Google? Because that seems like an incredible lapse of confidentiality in itself. Or will the notion that it wasn't legitimately their confidential data in the end, make Uber's own claim void?

Fricken 10y ago

In related news, Tesla is accusing ex-autopilot director Sterling Anderson of stealing code from Tesla before starting up Aurora with Chris Urmson (the former CTO of Alphabet's self driving car program): https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/26/tesla-sues-ex-autopilot-director-for-taking-proprietary-info-poaching-employees/ https://techcrunch.com/2017/01/26/tesla-sues-ex-autopilot-di...

jplayer01 10y ago

I always was incredibly surprised at how quickly Uber had working self-driving cars (with the required, highly specialized hardware). Guess this explains it.

tyingq 10y ago
Uber acquired Otto around 08/2016. I don't think this explains it.
- amaks 10y ago
  Who knows maybe they had somebody else from the Google self driving car project to steal self-driving car secrets earlier. Based on what this Levandowski guy did the industrial espionage may go unnoticed. I'm wondering if Waymo will require Uber to reveal schematics of their self-driving car project as part of the law suite.
  - tyingq 10y ago
    I have doubts what was stolen was actually any of the secret sauce. An interface board for a lidar unit is probably one of the most simple things on the list. The actual self driving software, and more importantly, all of the collected data from the waymo fleet would have been the key.
    - makomk 10y ago
      Not so much an interface board as a whole new tested design for a LIDAR unit, including a unique patented optics setup and laser driver circuit, according to the complaint. Also testing, manufacturing, and characterization procedures and results and information on suppliers for the parts required. The PCB was just the component whose accidental disclosure lead them to conclude that Uber and Otto were using the stolen design. Since the PCB apparently dictates the position and orientation of the laser diodes and sensors, presumably it would only be useful if they copied the whole thing.
      - 10y ago

fasteddie 10y ago

Maybe I have a selective memory as a former Zynga employee, but generally these "stolen documents" lawsuits in high profile tech companies have generally turned out to be pretty factual. Easy to prove, and hard to fake.

icelancer 10y ago
And lawsuits like this generally don't get filed unless it's near slam-dunk considering the burden of proof is high on stolen electronic documents.
- Kostchei 10y ago
  Considering even with logging off: journaling file systems, "user assist", device connection logs, pre-fetch (or your OS's equivalent)- these are all huge tranches of data if you are looking at a system shortly after an event. Ask me 6 months later- probably not. Give me a system that hasn't even rebooted, has a heap of ram and hasn't been used much since- 6 weeks is fine, not ideal, but doable.
  - valleyer 10y ago
    Journaling filesystems don't "journal" all the activity in perpetuity. They typically just journal the changes until they're committed to disk, usually for less than a second. See http://www.nobius.org/~dbg/practical-file-system-design.pdf http://www.nobius.org/~dbg/practical-file-system-design.pdf, section 7.2 "How Does Journaling Work?".

ww520 10y ago

How can you steal patents? Those are public info. Infringing on patents?

alex_young 10y ago
"Patent application nonpublication request"
praneshp 10y ago
The title is "Alphabet's Waymo Alleges Uber Stole Self-Driving Secrets". I hope the mods can change the HN article's to that.
the_watcher 10y ago
Yea, the title here is off. The lawsuit is over stealing secrets, not patents. Patented information is involved, it seems.

glibgil 10y ago

> searched for and installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop That could mean he downloaded an SFTP client like Cyberduck. He could have searched the internet for a client and then installed it. It doesn't say he did not have auth. Imagine a Google security engineer being deposed for this lawsuit. Lawyer: "Show me on the MacBook how he downloaded the files" Engineer: "Well, he used Cyberduck" Lawyer: "Is that part of the Mac?" Engineer: "No, he'd have to download it separately" Lawyer: "So, he searched for and installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop?" Engineer: "Um, sure" Lawyer: "Thank you, that's all the questions I had"

ocdtrekkie 10y ago
This is true, but it doesn't negate the issue. If you need some sort of client to gain access to the design server, and he didn't already have it, it very likely means that he didn't work on those files normally, and hence, really probably shouldn't have had access to them. He may not have installed "hacking tools" or anything like that, but he did specifically take action to access files he didn't normally use as part of his job. Which is, I think, all that this post is claiming.
Kostchei 10y ago
It could also be a e-discovery tool like Nuix. If you want to find all documents containing X amongst millions of docs- that's the sort of tool I would use (work in computer forensics) *edit. And 9.7 GB of data, assuming it's docs not "just' a lot of CAD is a lot of docs..
msbarnett 10y ago
> That could mean he downloaded an SFTP client like Cyberduck. He could have searched the internet for a client and then installed it. It doesn't say he did not have auth. They weren't trying to claim he hacked in. They're making the case he went out of his way to get his hands on these documents, and building a timeline that suggests why he went to that trouble.

amaks 10y ago

Things couldn't be worse for Uber these days. Sexual harassment scandal, Didi Chuxing plans for global expansion, now this lawsuit.

the_watcher 10y ago

Minor fix: Waymo is suing for stealing secrets, not patents. As far as I know, it's not actually possible to steal a patent.

lindowe 10y ago
Infringement of patents (the ’273 patent, entitled “Microrod Compression of Laser Beam in Combination with Transmit Lens")
- ssambros 10y ago
  Infringement, yes, but how can you 'steal' a patent?
  - the_watcher 10y ago
    That was exactly my point. Patents are definitionally impossible to steal (unless, I guess, you somehow are able to get access to the patent database and change the patent holder?)
- Animats 10y ago
  That's not a very interesting patent. It's basically some optical stuff to do LIDAR scanning with non-square pixels, presumably because you want more resolution in one axis than the other. That's nice, but not a big improvement over existing technology.

praneshp 10y ago

Could a mod change the title to "Alphabet's Waymo Alleges Uber Stole Self-Driving Secrets", which is what the Bloomberg article says (for now)?

grzm 10y ago
To expedite this, you may want to email the mods directly via the Contact link in the footer.

danjoc 10y ago

There's something very wrong in the world when the people who invent things aren't the main beneficiary of their own inventions. Edit: A guy downloads 9.7GB of other people's work, walks off with it, and sells it. Flushing years of work from hundreds of engineers down the toilet. You down voters really support that? Amazing.

the_economist 10y ago
I imagine that throughout human history this has been the case far often than not.
untilHellbanned 10y ago
Otto was a YC company so there's your answer. People condone a lot of awful if they 1) make money off it; 2) Have some emotional connection to it
- danjoc 10y ago
  I wasn't aware of that. Thank you for risking down votes to bring that to light.
  - justin 10y ago
    It's untrue. Otto was not a YC company.
- changdizzle 10y ago
  As far as I know Otto wasn't YC - are you sure you're not thinking of Cruise (which was acquired by GM)?
  - CardenB 10y ago
    He could be thinking of starsky robotics
- justin 10y ago
  This not true. Why would you spread this lie?

sriram_sun 10y ago

What kind of employee would download 14K files to a personal drive right before quitting? It is trivially easy to watch what files get copied over to external drives. I think you can follow the money trail here and find some answers for sure. Now if Uber/Otto has a clause that prohibits employees from bringing in confidential data from previous companies, how can they be held liable? Does Google have to prove that those stolen documents were actually used in Uber designs?

dba7dba 10y ago
A supplier of Google received the file from Uber and that supplier forwarded it to Google. This means the file was sent out by Uber to a supplier to try to get parts made. I think that's proof enough. Btw that's 1 very sharp eyed engineer, whoever that is...
- MertsA 10y ago
  >Btw that's 1 very sharp eyed engineer, whoever that is... It sounds like this was entirely accidental on the supplier's part.
jonstewart 10y ago
We call them "bad leavers" in the forensics industry. There are enough of them to keep us in business.

aramadia 10y ago

Direct link to the complaint: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

aramadia 10y ago

Direct link to the complaint: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...

croddin 10y ago

It looks like bloomberg updated the title to: "Alphabet's Waymo Alleges Uber Stole Self-Driving Secrets", which makes more sense. We should change the title here.

Animats 10y ago

Google might have been better off with patents than trade secrets. There are financial penalties for theft of trade secrets, but once the secret is out, no injunctions. The one who stole it can use it. With patents, injunctions are available, although hard to get. Anyway, several companies are developing automotive LIDAR units which are better than Google's rotating things. Quantergy and Velodyne claim to be close to low-cost solid state LIDARs, and ASC has good ones now at a high price point. (An ASC unit just docked the Dragon spacecraft with the ISS.) By the time this gets to court, Google's secret technology will be obsolete. The question is whether Uber will defend Levandowski or leave him to twist slowly, slowly in the wind and go to jail.

revelation 10y ago
I doubt there is any hot technology in some LIDAR interface board in the first place.
- Animats 10y ago
  There's a lot to be done at the semiconductor level for solid state LIDAR. The ASC units work great, but the sensor requires an InGaAs fab, like night vision sensors, to get good light sensitivity and thus range. Others are talking about getting good performance with a sensor that can be made in a CMOS fab, but nobody is shipping yet. This is an area where Waymo has a strong interest, even if they're not making the sensors themselves.
- jonstewart 10y ago
  Probably no way to improve TCP bandwidth either...
- MertsA 10y ago
  The board isn't the interesting bit, the board just shows that Otto was using Waymo's design. This also isn't what they're suing over, this was just the tip off they needed to figure out that the ex-employee stole data on the way out the door.

mylons 10y ago

uber is a DUMPSTER FIRE right now. feel bad for the engineers there who didn't steal anything.

gumby 10y ago

dang: just like we have warnings for [video] and [pdf] could we have warnings for autoplay video? I accidentally had the sound enabled on my computer.

w00tw00tw00t 10y ago

I had an interview there where the manager asked me to leave my laptop behind and go for a walk. I was hesitant after hearing stories of Uber conducting electronic espionage against its competitors. They could easily bypass Macbook security with a USB device (I had heard of that on HN too) so I was very nervous to leave my laptop behind and noted its exact orientation and position on the table. Sure enough when I returned my laptop had changed both position and orientation, but only enough to tell if you had specifically memorized it. I could be paranoid. They could have simply moved things on the desk. But anyway, people who are paranoid like me are advised not to take their laptops into Uber interviews. They are capable of just about anything, or so thinks my now paranoid self.

fuzzythinker 10y ago
Thanks for the info. Will know not leave my laptop behind in any interviews.
- cmyr 10y ago
  A better strategy is just to not interview at uber.
- tomjakubowski 10y ago
  I've never felt the need to bring my own laptop to a job interview. If the company asked me to bring my own, I'd consider that strange or even suspicious.
  - whorleater 10y ago
    It'd be really weird for them to request you to bring a laptop, but sometimes when a company flies you out for an onsite and your return flight is that night, your options are either 1) leave your laptop with the hotel as luggage (pretty bad) or 2) bring your laptop to the interview. There's no real reason for them to know you have your laptop with you however.
    - 10y ago

huangc10 10y ago

> Alphabet’s venture capital arm, GV -- formerly known as Google Ventures -- is an early backer of Uber. Correct me if I am wrong, but does that mean Alphabet is suing itself since Alphabet owns both Google Venture, Waymo and has an investment in Uber...?

kyleschiller 10y ago
Yeah, that's wrong, being an investor in a company doesn't make you liable for their actions. It does mean that Alphabet stands to lose something if they win the lawsuit, though whatever stake they do have in Uber is obviously negligible compared to WayMo itself.

james_niro 10y ago

I need popcorn and front row seat for this

lsh123 10y ago

Google was on the other side before: https://techcrunch.com/2011/05/26/paypal-lawsuit-google/ https://techcrunch.com/2011/05/26/paypal-lawsuit-google/

zaatar 10y ago
What was the outcome of this lawsuit?
- lsh123 10y ago
  Was curious too, can't find it anywhere.

dkarapetyan 10y ago

This is a little idiotic. Alphabet let all their talent walk out the door. I'm assuming mostly because of idiotic management and now they're suing. They're basically losing on all sides.

giis 10y ago

Interesting questions for google employees: Does Google force you to use specific version of OS? Do they have pre-installed software? Is it not-okay to format and install any OS you want? I work in startups, they provide only laptops and doesnt care about OS or software. There is no mandatory software requirement from company side.

CardenB 10y ago
Yes, they have Goobuntu. Believe so. No it isn't. Lastly, you have to ssh into a workstation to access any files and you aren't allowed to have files downloaded locally for this exact reason. He would have had to have gone through some trouble to even obtain these files locally I would imagine.
ocdtrekkie 10y ago
My understanding is that Google has users on Linux, Mac, and Windows, and has resources for managing all of them. As the other commenter points out, Goobuntu is a custom distro of Ubuntu that Googlers use. I do recall hearing people tended to need a justification for needing Windows, but I'm pretty sure OS X users are common.
QuercusMax 10y ago
For eng workstations, virtually all are Goobuntu unless you have a reallllly good reason (e.g. CAD software for mech e's, or work on Windows Chrome). For laptops, they're essentially just used as a dumb web terminal + ssh. You can get mac, goobuntu, or maybe even Windows. Since you aren't allowed to have source code on laptops (except certain special exceptions), it's not as big of a concern.
- valleyer 10y ago
  You aren't allowed to have source on your laptop? How do you edit it? Through some web editor? Serious question!
  - UncleMeat 10y ago

dnautics 10y ago

Is the HN headline correct? The bloomberg article says "trade secrets" which are very different from patents, the video also says that this is not primarily a patent case. edit: 0:48 in the video

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

bitL 10y ago

This is going to be interesting to watch. Alphabet just: - went nuclear on Uber/Otto - revealed what they track internally to all their employees

morecoffee 10y ago
Google employees are probably aware they are being tracked. Keeping such a thing a secret would likely result in more leaks, not fewer.
- delroth 10y ago
  Not only is it very well known internally, Google has even open sourced some of the tools that are used for that purpose: https://github.com/google/grr https://github.com/google/grr
  - bitL 10y ago
    Still, how can they work in a basically zero trust environment? They can't hope anyone reasonable will come up with some great idea and willingly share it with them.
marricks 10y ago
I think it's reasonable to be suspicious but what they described sounds mostly feasible without extra steps of tracking. What evidence did they present and how could it be tracked? - downloaded 9.7 GB of waymo data -> server logs of what files where accessed and downloaded by what user - searched for special software -> he used google while logged into a work account, so they just looked up that work accounts search history - Connected external hard drive and wiped data -> Short of automatic backups or something this seems like there is software explicitly for tracking when data is copied, where, and how much Most of this besides the external hard drive part can be done by any employer who owns your work your gmail account. What really should be alarming is how easy it is for your employer to get lots of data on you even if they aren't some tech giant.
- 10y ago

dba7dba 10y ago

So a junior engineer took the files, left Waymo to join Uber and tried to pass off the files? Correction. So he's not really a junior engineer. But how can he not think that everything he access on the Google's network is monitored?

guelo 10y ago
"now serves as a top ranking Uber executive"
- dba7dba 10y ago
  Lol, yeah my bad. My God. What a waste of talent of him, and waste of time/energy for everyone involved. I wonder if Uber accepted the stolen files from Google knowing they were stolen.
hluska 10y ago
Not quite... First, Levandowski is far from a junior engineer. He's been described as the tech lead at Waymo and worked on Google Maps and Streetview. Second, he left Waymo to co-found Otto, a startup which existed for six months before Uber acquired it for several hundred million dollars. Third, he's now described as a senior executive at Uber. I'm not sure where Facebook comes from here. Did I miss something??
- dba7dba 10y ago
  Yes, yes. One must not comment on HN while coding (simple stuff) and eating snack, and telling kids to do their homework. I work from home today. My apologies...
  - hluska 10y ago
    Don't worry bud and thanks for your reply!! I knew there was a 50% chance that I was severely confused and I appreciate you taking the time to clarify.
dang 10y ago

guelo 10y ago

Wow this has got to be the worse single month for a company that I've ever seen.

megablast 10y ago
So you've never heard of Enron?
_audakel 10y ago
Or Microsoft antitrust?
- edblarney 10y ago
  Please - Microsoft antitrust was nothing like this. Microsoft was basically extremely successful - and then became a monopoly provider. In general, I wouldn't call this an 'immoral act' or whatever. Also - I'd suggest that Google is just as much a Monopoly provider as MS ever was, they could face the same type of case in EU soon. Stealing IP, lying, corruption - this is in a whole different league from being so successful that you become a monopoly.
- filthee 10y ago
  Or Samsung

jfoster 10y ago

> Recently, we received an unexpected email. One of our suppliers specializing in LiDAR components sent us an attachment (apparently inadvertently) of machine drawings of what was purported to be Uber’s LiDAR circuit board — except its design bore a striking resemblance to Waymo’s unique LiDAR design. Doesn't sound plausible. At a minimum, this would have to be the "dumbed down" version of how they uncovered this.

twinkletwinkle 10y ago

Interesting. I vividly remember a commenter here on a thread about Uber's acquisition of Otto. The user said based on the timeline and filings, it seemed like Otto hadn't really accomplished anything yet, and was probably founded purely to be acquired by Uber. I wonder if there's even more here...

golfer 10y ago

Does anyone else remember this New Yorker profile [1] of Anthony Levandowski and self driving cars? Way back from 2013, when this tech was still novel. Google let Levandowski run the show for this piece -- his name is mentioned 57 times in the article. Goes to show how important and trusted he was in Google's universe. [1] http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/11/25/auto-correct http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/11/25/auto-correct

cpeterso 10y ago
Anthony Levandowski was targeted back in 2014 by protesters against Google's military work with Boston Dynamics. https://arstechnica.com/business/2014/01/protestors-show-up-at-the-doorstep-of-google-self-driving-car-engineer/ https://arstechnica.com/business/2014/01/protestors-show-up-... http://www.berkeleyside.com/2014/01/22/activists-target-google-employee-berkeley-resident/ http://www.berkeleyside.com/2014/01/22/activists-target-goog...
Animats 10y ago
Sure. I met him when he was still a student at UC Berkeley. He was the one who built the self-driving, self-balancing motorcycle for the 2005 DARPA Grand Challenge. It didn't navigate that well or get all that far, but it was really cool.

Fricken 10y ago

Presumably you're in Arizona at the moment, Mr. Levandowski, it's close to the border, run for it! We'll take a moment to remember the salad days, when you were just a crazy college kid who showed up at the Darpa Grand Challenge with a self driving motorcycle: https://youtu.be/XOgkNh_IPjU https://youtu.be/XOgkNh_IPjU

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selftemp 10y ago

Copy-pasting from my comment on Reddit. The first thing that caught my attention after reading the whole lawsuit! https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k... [Item 42- 49] itself is some of the timings regarding Otto's inception and Uber's acquisition. Timeline: * Levandowski first registered the domain for his then(now Otto) company on Nov'15 * The suit says on 3rd of Dec'15 he searched for the LIDAR docs and on 11th of Dec'15, he downloaded 14,000 docs from Google's servers. * Google alleges that on Jan'16, Levandowski told his colleagues that he plans to replicate the Waymo tech at one of Waymo's competitor. * One of the damning allegation from Waymo is that he met with top execs at Uber at their HQ in SF on Jan 14th 2016. * Just a day later on 15th he officially formed one of his company(280 Systems, now part of Otto), later on Feb 1st he also registered his other company(Otto Trucking) Feb 1st. * Strangely after working at Google for about 7 years, he quit Google without a notice(from suit) on Jan 27th. This is from the interview Bloomberg's did after Uber acquired Otto: 'Kalanick began courting Levandowski this spring, broaching the possibility of an acquisition during a series of 10-mile night walks from the Soma neighborhood where Uber is also headquartered to the Golden Gate Bridge. The two men would leave their offices separately—to avoid being seen by employees, the press, or competitors. They’d grab takeout food, then rendezvous near the city’s Ferry Building. Levandowski says he saw a union as a way to bring the company’s trucks to market faster.' From the above details, it can imply any of these three things might have happened, * Scenario 1: He or Uber didn't do anything different from the official story so far. * Scenario 2: Levandowski went to Uber saying he has custom LIDAR tech but ended up starting his own company the next day and 8 months later Uber just bought them for $680M for the team and tech he alleged stole from Waymo. * Scenario 3: Levandowski went to Uber in Jan'16, said he has the tech for custom LIDAR, Uber wants it, but there is non-suspicious way for taking the tech directly to Uber since Levandowski alone can't build it. Instead Uber suggests to spin off his own company, hire a team (mostly from Waymo), put together a demo in Nevada desert. This brings in all the press and validity that Otto has the self-driving tech and team. So at this point Otto and Levandowski is a Self-driving tech startup not a LIDAR startup. Now Uber can come in, acquire this hot startup and team, in a market that's worth Trillions. Now Uber is suddenly in the trucking business, gets a huge PR and valuation bump. In this process they also get the LIDAR tech that's build in just 9 months. What it means is that if the 3rd theory is true, Uber was always buying the LIDAR tech from Levandowski even before he left Waymo. Otto and other components are just a proxy so that it gives them a great story without any suspicions. To put things into perspective, a single Velodyne HDL-64E LIDAR that almost all self-driving companies use costs around $75,000. Waymo says their equivalent custom alternative costs less than 10% (<$7000). This is a huge cost saving for a tech that is going to go in 100,000+ cars Uber hopes to have in the market in the future. So yea, this can be a bullshit Lawsuit (based on the evidence, less likely) or a well executed corporate espionage!

monktastic1 10y ago

His favorite quote: "I drink your milkshake." Wish I were kidding.

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sebleon 10y ago

Seems like Google/Waymo has known about this for a while, funny how they timed this lawsuit announcement during the Fowler blog post uproar

equalarrow 10y ago
Yup, timing is everything. For press.. I doubt tho, this will affect the lawsuit.

seesomesense 10y ago

Sounds a bit like the Aleynikov saga.. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-24/aleynikov-s-conviction-is-reinstated-by-state-appeals-court https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-24/aleynikov...

KKKKkkkk1 10y ago

It's sad how G lost its top engineers and is now trying to get back at them in the courts.

jpeg_hero 10y ago

Lots of Juice here. Complaint: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k... >Waymo was recently – and apparently inadvertently – copied on an email from one of its LiDAR component vendors. Is this going to be a legal test of that annoying lawyer email footer language? >This message contains information from xxxxxx that may be confidential and privileged. If you are not an intended recipient, please refrain from any disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of this information and note that such actions are prohibited. If you have received this information in error, please notify the sender immediately by telephone or by replying to this transmission. Ha! More legalese BS that never holds up. > Otto launched publicly in May 2016, and was quickly acquired by Uber in August 2016 for $680 million. The fact pattern here is going to be absolutely brutal for Uber. A non-technical judge is going to see the allegation: ex-google employee downloads technical documents in December 2015, launches a company 5 months later in May 2016, and is bought for $680M (later speculated to be $1B+) for all its technical accomplishments. How much fundamental research did they do in the 3 months between May-16 and August-16?!?!? Or was it just to buy the stolen IP that google had developed over 7 years?!? Brutal for Uber! -- A public company recently settled a similar lawsuit (competitor hires exec, exec is proven to have downloaded documents) for $130M on much smaller numbers. And the defendant was run through the legal wringer first. http://www.geekwire.com/2016/zillow-realtor-com-operator-move-move-reach/ http://www.geekwire.com/2016/zillow-realtor-com-operator-mov... Expect Uber spankage, bigly. > shortly after Mr. Levandowski received his final multi-million dollar payment from Google Funny because of all the recent press that Google paid autonomous driving talent too much that they left! >Infringement of Patent No. 9,368,936 (Against All Defendants) Real nasty. If a trade secrets lawsuit is an arrow, throwing in a patent infringement claim too, is poison tipped and barbed! This is some good "old skool Google" where they used to show broad competence across many domains; in this case legal.

sriram_sun 10y ago

The medium article also notes that a couple more employees stole confidential information. Five years later Waymo employees will be bitching and moaning about corporate overreach and will have these fucktards to thank. (If allegations are proved).

tlrobinson 10y ago

Well, that would help explain how Otto went from nothing to $680 million acquisition in ~7 months.

home_boi 10y ago

Despite the damning alleged evidence, I get the feeling that all the offenders knew that they would be found out ahead of time, evaluated the risk reward trade-off and decided that they could somehow get away with it. Are there any lawyers here who could make an educated guess how they could?

bmon 10y ago
Well a good start would be using a different supplier than Waymo.

zump 10y ago

Anyone here would do the same thing.

bmon 10y ago
Maybe you might, but if you give me the choice of being in jail or not, I think I'd rather keep my windows unbarred.
- zump 10y ago
  He's not going to jail, he's white.
  - dang 10y ago
    We've banned this account for posting unsubstantive comments and ignoring repeated requests to stop. If you don't want it to be banned, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and promise to follow the rules in the future.

dantiberian 10y ago

A really critical thing that hasn't got much attention is that shortly before leaving Waymo, Levandowski had a meeting with senior Uber execs(!). The day after the meeting, he formed 280 Systems which became Otto. The implication in the filing is that Uber planned this with Levandowski, and he only created Otto as a plausible corporate vehicle for developing the LiDAR technology before Uber acquired them. Given what we know about Uber and the assertions in the complaint, this sounds entirely plausible, maybe even likely. https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...

fullshark 10y ago
Paragraph 48 if anyone is wondering.

samfisher83 10y ago

Google has shares in uber. If they sue them and win their shares are theoretically worth less. I guess if they win enough money it works out.

brilliantcode 10y ago

This will put a permanent blow to Uber, it's in a tight spot already and self driving cars are it's only chance of survival. If there's anyway to short Uber or any of the other unicorns kept afloat by low interest venture capital, please let me know.

lexap 10y ago

The timing here is just way too coincidental. Coming at a fresh nadir in Uber's standing in the tech industry, the week after Fowler's post. For how long did Google know Levandowski had swiped its secrets? This is how PR war is waged.