4 ms·

I don't want to defend Uber here, but I don't see what this letter business has to do with Waymo's allegedly stolen LIDAR. Why should Uber have disclosed this l

I don't want to defend Uber here, but I don't see what this letter business has to do with Waymo's allegedly stolen LIDAR. Why should Uber have disclosed this letter to Waymo? Also, I don't see what's the legal problem with spying on your competitors. I mean, Google and Facebook are spying on their customers, and the law apparently has no problem with that.

jhall1468 9y ago
> Also, I don't see what's the legal problem with spying on your competitors. I mean, Google and Facebook are spying on their customers, and the law apparently has no problem with that. It's not spying, it's doing so illegally. Facebook and Google don't do that. The letter accuses Uber of doing just that, and that's pretty damned relevant in a case where Uber stole trade secrets.
- malandrew 9y ago
  “I did not believe it was patently illegal,” Jacobs said. “I had questions about the ethics of it. I suppose because of my personal ethics it felt overly aggressive and invasive.” ref: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-28/waymo-trial-delayed-again-with-sharp-words-for-uber-from-judge https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-28/waymo-tri...
  - jhall1468 9y ago
    He's not a lawyer. The question is a question to debate legally. When something is questionably ethical, whether or not it's legal is dependent on the outcome of a trial. An employee was accusing them of doing something highly unethical and potentially illegal regarding information about competitors. Again, that's incredibly relevant.
scott_karana 9y ago
"Paying a Google employee to steal their designs and sell them to you" is vastly different than regular industrial espionage.
- londons_explore 9y ago
  Sounds exactly like regular espionage to me. Hiring employees from competitors with "5 years experience in this exact line of work" really is espionage on a small scale. They will use their knowledge of what doesn't work, and how not to approach problems gleaned from their previous employer to solve your problems much quicker. Previous employers cost to develop a space laser: 5 years. Time to re-invent space laser when you already know how to do it: 6 months.
  - scott_karana 9y ago
    That's still different than bringing literal, patented design files with you. ;) Time to invent: 0
MertsA 9y ago
>I don't want to defend Uber here, but I don't see what this letter business has to do with Waymo's allegedly stolen LIDAR. We don't know what's in the letter (yet) but it very well could touch on exactly what Uber was trying to hide, hence the 7.5 million dollar bribe.
gpm 9y ago
Everyone ignored the most important part of your question, which is "Why should Uber have disclosed this letter to Waymo?" They should have because in a civil case like this there is a property called discovery where each side gets to request certain information from the other side. And the other side is required to give it or argue it's outside the bounds of what they can request to the judge, who will decide. In this case Uber had already legally agreed/been ordered to give Waymo all documents in categories this letter clearly falls under, in various ways. For instance one of the more damning given what we know about the letter would be "All DOCUMENTS REGARDING DEFENDANTS’ policies regarding employees’ use of personal computers or other devices while working at or for DEFENDANTS." A lot is still redacted from the public, but you can see more details on page 7 of their brief: https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.308136/gov.uscourts.cand.308136.2281.3.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.308136... I say this is the most important part of your question, because this is the one area where Uber pretty much unquestionably, intentionally broke the law. Regardless of whether or the allegations in the letter are true, it was a document that they were legally required to turn over but didn't. The head council explicitly made the decision to turn it over to the US attorney and not Waymo so it's not even plausible they missed it. (I am not a lawyer)

jhall1468 9y ago

> Also, I don't see what's the legal problem with spying on your competitors. I mean, Google and Facebook are spying on their customers, and the law apparently has no problem with that. It's not spying, it's doing so illegally. Facebook and Google don't do that. The letter accuses Uber of doing just that, and that's pretty damned relevant in a case where Uber stole trade secrets.

malandrew 9y ago
“I did not believe it was patently illegal,” Jacobs said. “I had questions about the ethics of it. I suppose because of my personal ethics it felt overly aggressive and invasive.” ref: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-28/waymo-trial-delayed-again-with-sharp-words-for-uber-from-judge https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-28/waymo-tri...
- jhall1468 9y ago
  He's not a lawyer. The question is a question to debate legally. When something is questionably ethical, whether or not it's legal is dependent on the outcome of a trial. An employee was accusing them of doing something highly unethical and potentially illegal regarding information about competitors. Again, that's incredibly relevant.

scott_karana 9y ago

"Paying a Google employee to steal their designs and sell them to you" is vastly different than regular industrial espionage.

londons_explore 9y ago
Sounds exactly like regular espionage to me. Hiring employees from competitors with "5 years experience in this exact line of work" really is espionage on a small scale. They will use their knowledge of what doesn't work, and how not to approach problems gleaned from their previous employer to solve your problems much quicker. Previous employers cost to develop a space laser: 5 years. Time to re-invent space laser when you already know how to do it: 6 months.
- scott_karana 9y ago
  That's still different than bringing literal, patented design files with you. ;) Time to invent: 0

MertsA 9y ago

>I don't want to defend Uber here, but I don't see what this letter business has to do with Waymo's allegedly stolen LIDAR. We don't know what's in the letter (yet) but it very well could touch on exactly what Uber was trying to hide, hence the 7.5 million dollar bribe.

gpm 9y ago

Everyone ignored the most important part of your question, which is "Why should Uber have disclosed this letter to Waymo?" They should have because in a civil case like this there is a property called discovery where each side gets to request certain information from the other side. And the other side is required to give it or argue it's outside the bounds of what they can request to the judge, who will decide. In this case Uber had already legally agreed/been ordered to give Waymo all documents in categories this letter clearly falls under, in various ways. For instance one of the more damning given what we know about the letter would be "All DOCUMENTS REGARDING DEFENDANTS’ policies regarding employees’ use of personal computers or other devices while working at or for DEFENDANTS." A lot is still redacted from the public, but you can see more details on page 7 of their brief: https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.308136/gov.uscourts.cand.308136.2281.3.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.308136... I say this is the most important part of your question, because this is the one area where Uber pretty much unquestionably, intentionally broke the law. Regardless of whether or the allegations in the letter are true, it was a document that they were legally required to turn over but didn't. The head council explicitly made the decision to turn it over to the US attorney and not Waymo so it's not even plausible they missed it. (I am not a lawyer)