The use of coal to generate electricity on the US grid has been plunging for nearly two decades, and the first Trump administration was unable to affect the trend. So his second administration has attempted more aggressive interventions to prop up coal use. One of its most direct means of doing so is to order coal plants that were scheduled to close to remain open, even if there is no need for them.
The administration's justification for these orders is a statute that allows the Department of Energy (DOE) to declare an emergency in the case of wartime or a sudden shortfall in generation. A number of parties, including states where coal plants have been slated to close, have challenged this declaration. And on Friday, in the first of these cases to make its way through the courts, the declaration was judged to be contrary to the statute. While this only affects a single coal plant in Michigan, the reasoning of the decision will apply to every coal plant closure that has been blocked by the DOE.
No emergency
The decision was issued by a unanimous three-judge panel from the DC Circuit's Court of Appeals. It focuses on the J.H. Campbell Generating Plant, which was scheduled to close last year but has been kept open by a total of five emergency declarations by the DOE, each limited to 90 days by the Federal Power Act. At issue was section 202(c) of that Act, which allows the DOE to declare emergencies when the US is at war or when “an emergency exists by reason of a sudden increase in the demand for electric energy, or a shortage of electric energy.”
App Tracking Transparency is at the center of a new UK lawsuit seeking approximately $2.7 billion (£2 billion), putting one of the most recognizable iPhone privacy features under fresh legal pressure. The claim follows earlier challenges to the tracking system in France, but this action seeks compensation for developers who say Apple imposed unfair restrictions on their businesses while favoring its own advertising services.
Filed on September 3 at London’s Competition Appeal Tribunal, the case represents another dispute over the rules behind the familiar permission prompt. Apple rejects the allegations and maintains that it follows the same App Tracking Transparency requirements as other developers.
The amount being sought is not a fine or an awarded payment. It is the claimants’ estimate of losses, which Apple disputes.
What the App Tracking Transparency Lawsuit Alleges
The action was brought by ATT Collective Action Limited, whose director, Ann Pope, previously led antitrust enforcement at the UK Competition and Markets Authority. Law firm Hausfeld is representing the proposed class.
According to Hausfeld’s announcement of the claim, developers argue that Apple introduced the framework unfairly, without adequate consultation, and applied more burdensome requirements to outside businesses than to its own services.
The complaint focuses partly on consent. It alleges that third-party developers must obtain permission under data-protection law and then secure an additional approval through the iOS tracking prompt. Apple’s advertising services, the claimants argue, operate under a less demanding process.
Developers also contend that the introduction left them insufficient time to adapt business models dependent on advertising.
These are allegations about how the system was designed and introduced—not established findings in this UK case. The claimants’ stated position is that privacy protections should remain compatible with fair treatment of businesses.
Image Credit: AppleMagazine
What the Tracking Prompt Actually Protects
For someone using an iPhone, App Tracking Transparency offers a direct choice about a practice that previously could be difficult to see.
An app may want to connect information about your activity with information gathered through other companies’ apps or websites. That connection can help advertisers build a profile, target advertisements, or measure whether an advertising campaign led to a purchase.
Under Apple’s explanation of the tracking rules, apps must request permission before carrying out the tracking covered by the framework. Choosing “Ask App Not to Track” blocks access to the system advertising identifier and prohibits using other identifying information to perform that tracking instead.
The feature arrived with iOS 14.5 in 2021. It does not remove advertisements, make an app anonymous, or serve as a universal switch for every kind of data collection.
That boundary matters. A retailer remembering purchases made within its own service is not automatically doing the same thing as an advertising company linking activity across unrelated businesses.
The disagreement concerns whether those distinctions, and the consent processes built around them, give Apple an unfair commercial advantage.
Apple Says the Same Rules Apply to Everyone
Apple has responded directly to the lawsuit, defending the feature as a way to give people control over tracking across other companies’ services.
In a statement reported by AFP, a spokesperson said: “Apple is bound by the exact same requirements as all developers under ATT.”
The company also pointed to support for the feature from customers and privacy advocates.
That response challenges the foundation of the developers’ case. Apple presents App Tracking Transparency as a rule based on the type of data activity involved. The claimants argue that its practical operation places competing advertising businesses at a disadvantage.
Resolving that disagreement requires more than comparing the appearance of two permission screens. The underlying data uses, consent requirements, and commercial effects all matter.
Why Free Apps Are Part of the Dispute
Advertising can support both sides of an app business. A developer may sell advertising space inside a free app while also buying advertisements elsewhere to attract new users.
A change to tracking can therefore affect how much an app earns and how confidently its developer can measure spending on promotion.
Consider a small game studio. It needs to know whether an advertising campaign brings in players who keep using the game. If measurement becomes less precise, deciding where to spend the next marketing dollar becomes harder. Separately, advertisers may value the game’s available ad space differently when less information is available for targeting.
That explains the commercial concern without proving the legal claim. Losing revenue after a privacy change does not, by itself, establish that the change was unlawful.
There is also a consumer interest that cannot be reduced to advertising performance. Someone choosing not to be tracked is expressing a preference about personal information, not making a promise to preserve a developer’s previous income.
The difficult question is whether that preference can be protected through a system that treats competing businesses fairly.
France Has Already Examined the Consent Process
The UK action arrives after a separate French competition investigation found problems with the implementation of App Tracking Transparency.
In its March 2025 decision, France’s Autorité de la concurrence distinguished between the legitimate objective of protecting privacy and the way Apple pursued it.
The authority criticized multiple consent requests and differences in treatment between Apple and outside publishers. It also highlighted the position of smaller businesses that lack the extensive first-party data available to large platforms.
Importantly, the French authority did not argue that people should lose the ability to refuse tracking. It said adjustments to the framework could address competition concerns while retaining privacy protections.
That distinction leaves room for changes to wording, consent flows, or implementation without automatically requiring the removal of the feature. The French decision, however, does not determine liability or compensation in the separate UK proceedings.
The Claim Is for Developers, Not iPhone Owners
The official claim website describes a proposed action for UK-based app developers affected since April 2021. It estimates losses across the group rather than offering a fixed payment to everyone who owns an iPhone.
The proposed scope includes developers earning advertising revenue from third-party iOS apps and developers spending money to attract users to those apps. Whether compensation becomes available depends on the proceedings and their outcome.
For U.S. readers, the filing does not announce a change to domestic iPhone settings or create a consumer refund program. There is no reason to grant an app tracking permission simply because its developer objects to the framework.
Businesses following the case should also distinguish registering interest from receiving compensation. The claim website currently invites affected organizations to provide their details; it is not distributing a settlement.
Sam Altman has described himself as a “mega Apple fanboy” while discussing the trade secrets lawsuit now dividing two companies that were close technology partners only two years ago.
Speaking with journalist Alex Heath on the Sources podcast, the OpenAI CEO said he was “very sad” when he learned about the case. His admiration for Apple, however, did not soften his rejection of the allegations against OpenAI and two former employees.
Altman said the company does not want another business’s intellectual property and would dismiss anyone found to have improperly brought confidential material into OpenAI. He also said an internal investigation left him convinced that the employee at the center of the dispute had not acted improperly.
That is OpenAI’s account, not a resolution of the lawsuit. Apple alleges that trade secrets connected to hardware design, manufacturing and supply-chain operations were taken for the benefit of OpenAI’s consumer-device program. The defendants deny wrongdoing, and the court has not settled those competing claims.
Sam Altman Separates Personal Admiration From the Case
Altman’s response was unusually personal for a dispute of this scale.
Technology executives normally leave active litigation to lawyers and carefully written company statements. Calling himself a fanboy places Altman on familiar ground with millions of customers who admire Apple products while disagreeing with a corporate decision.
His first reaction, he said, was to assume that the accusations sounded serious enough that someone must have behaved badly. OpenAI then examined the matter and reached a different view.
Altman said the company would act if it found that someone had taken another company’s intellectual property. At the same time, he argued that an employee who had done nothing wrong deserved a defense.
That distinction is central to OpenAI’s public position. It does not deny that former Apple employees now work on its hardware initiative. Instead, the company disputes the allegation that their movement between employers brought protected information into the program.
Personal admiration cannot answer the evidentiary questions. Being a customer, praising a company or enjoying its products has no bearing on whether confidential files were accessed or used. Altman’s comments are more revealing as an account of how sharply the relationship has changed.
OpenAI once promoted its work with Apple as a partnership built around safety, innovation and access to advanced AI. It now describes the lawsuit as aggressive, inaccurate and unnecessary.
Image Credit: OpenAI
From ChatGPT Partnership to Hardware Rivalry
In June 2024, both companies announced an agreement to integrate ChatGPT into experiences across iPhone, iPad and Mac.
Siri could ask for permission to send certain requests to ChatGPT, while Writing Tools could use the model for composition and image generation. The integration gave OpenAI direct exposure inside some of the world’s most widely used personal devices without requiring every user to create an account.
At the time, Sam Altman said the partnership would introduce ChatGPT to users in a new way. Apple presented the external model as an optional extension of Apple Intelligence, keeping permission and privacy controls between the user and the third-party service.
The arrangement made sense while the companies occupied complementary positions. Apple controlled the devices and operating systems; OpenAI supplied a widely recognized generative model.
Consumer hardware changed that balance.
OpenAI is developing a family of AI-native devices with designer Jony Ive, whose work at Apple helped shape products including iPhone, iMac, iPod and Apple Watch. Tang Tan, another longtime hardware figure who previously worked on major Apple products, is now OpenAI’s chief hardware officer.
Once OpenAI began recruiting deeply from Apple’s hardware organization, the relationship was no longer limited to providing a model inside Siri. The companies were moving toward competition over the physical objects through which people may interact with AI.
That competition helps explain why the lawsuit reaches beyond an ordinary employment disagreement. Hardware development depends on manufacturing knowledge, component choices, testing systems, supplier relationships and production methods that can take years to build.
Apple’s complaint alleges that OpenAI benefited from confidential information in those areas. OpenAI argues that the case is being used to slow a potential rival and discourage employees from leaving.
What Apple Alleges Against OpenAI
Apple filed its lawsuit in July against OpenAI, Tang Tan and former electrical engineer Chang Liu.
The complaint alleges that former employees misappropriated trade secrets connected to product development and shared them with OpenAI as it accelerated its consumer-hardware ambitions. Apple has also sought a preliminary injunction intended to prevent the use of disputed information while the case proceeds.
According to Associated Press reporting on the original complaint, Apple accused OpenAI of encouraging recruits to provide confidential knowledge and advising them on how to avoid scrutiny during the transition between companies.
Those are allegations. OpenAI has denied that it requested, received or wants Apple’s trade secrets.
In its public response, OpenAI disputed several details surrounding Apple’s communications and treatment of departing employees. It argued that continued access to some files resulted from Apple’s own account-management practices and said former employees had attempted to handle that access responsibly.
OpenAI also said Tan had instructed his team not to use confidential material belonging to previous employers. Its motion to dismiss asks the court to reject Apple’s case, while its opposition to the requested injunction challenges the evidence and need for immediate restrictions.
Reuters reported that roughly 400 former Apple employees had joined OpenAI’s hardware initiative, according to figures appearing in court filings. Headcount alone does not establish misuse of trade secrets. It does illustrate the scale of the talent movement and why the dispute has become a defining fight over the next generation of personal hardware.
OpenAI’s Device Work Is Continuing
Sam Altman said he does not expect the lawsuit to slow the company’s device program.
That is the most direct business claim in his interview. It suggests that OpenAI has separated disputed material and personnel questions from the work it believes can continue without relying on protected Apple information.
Whether the schedule remains unaffected may depend on the court. A preliminary injunction could impose restrictions before a full trial, depending on its scope. A denial would allow development to proceed without that requested intervention, although the wider lawsuit would remain active.
OpenAI has revealed little about the devices themselves. The company has discussed an AI-native hardware family rather than a single conventional phone replacement, and Altman has spoken about the privacy discomfort created by products that visibly point cameras at other people.
That leaves the design, release timing and commercial strategy largely unknown. No product has been publicly introduced, and Altman’s assurance that development continues does not amount to a launch announcement.
The lawsuit also does not automatically end ChatGPT’s role across Apple platforms. The existing integration remains a separate customer-facing arrangement unless either company announces a change.
For people using ChatGPT through Siri or Writing Tools, the legal conflict currently produces more drama in court filings than difference on the screen. The stranger question is how long two companies can remain software partners while preparing to compete over the device sitting on the table beside that screen.
Image Credit: Samuel Boivin—NurPhoto via Getty Images
Apple is facing a £2 billion ($2.7 billion) London lawsuit brought on behalf of app developers over its app tracking rules, with the iPhone maker accused of abusing its power to unfairly impose greater restrictions on third parties.
[…]
Lawyers bringing the new lawsuit against Apple, though, say the feature imposed stricter requirements on third-party app developers than on Apple’s own services, giving its advertising ecosystem a competitive advantage.
The latest lawsuit has an interesting twist: it’s being brought by Ann Pope, who was previously a senior official with the regulator behind today’s case.
The company told Reuters it was “bound by the exact same requirements as all developers.”
However, regulators across Europe including in France, Italy and Poland have investigated ATT. Germany’s competition regulator, the Federal Cartel Office, last month determined that Apple was favoring its own apps over those from external developers.
The EU is saying “you’re big enough that you have to treat your other business models like third parties” and Apple replies with “but we know we’re solid, so that makes no sense!”
A US federal judge has sided with Google, ruling that the company will not have to sell its online advertising exchange (previously known as AdX). The US Department of Justice (DOJ) sought this remedy in the long-running ad tech antitrust trial, which Google lost in 2025. However, the remedies imposed upon Google for that loss are shaping up to be minimal.
[…]
While divesting the ad exchange would have been the most serious penalty, the government also asked for fines and court-ordered changes to Google’s business practices. It’s likely that the DOJ will get a lot of that, but we don’t know the specifics yet. Judge Leonie Brinkema has sealed the order for 14 days, giving the parties a chance to request redactions.
[…]
After all these years of hearings, appeals, and decisions, Google’s market power will remain largely unchanged going forward.
The settlement between Google and Epic that aimed to put to rest the companies’ long-running antitrust battle is being withdrawn, and that means third-party app stores are coming to the Play Store.
[…]
While Apple suffered little penalty in its Epic case, Google was tripped up by its anti-competitive management of the supposedly open Android ecosystem. Google used its market position to discourage device makers from promoting or pre-loading non-Google app stores and attempted to hide that conduct. The remedies set by Judge James Donato included lower fees, mirroring Google Play apps in other stores, and most vitally, placement of alternative app stores in Google Play.
[…]
Google and Epic were set to return to court on July 16 to argue in favor of the settlement. However, the writing may have been on the wall. In a recent expert analysis provided to the court, MIT economics professor Nancy Rose noted that the settlement was “unlikely to enable Google Play’s potential competitors to overcome their long-standing network-effect disadvantage in a timely manner.”
[…]
Under the terms of Judge Donato’s original injunction, these stores will have access to the full catalog of Google Play apps by default. […] Google will also require approved stores to block malware, respect intellectual property, and include mechanisms to update and uninstall apps.
Liu downloaded the circuit schematic from Apple in March, two months after he left the company. Liu used the schematic to run a simulation using electrical engineering tool LTspice, and then messaged people telling them he ran the simulation for power conversion development work.
[…]
Liu used the Apple schematic on a Mac mini that later synced to the MacBook he took from Apple, which is why Apple knows about it. Apple now wants to investigate the Mac mini and other devices Liu still has in his possession.
Apple says the “shocking evidence” is proof that its trade secrets are in active use and evidence is being destroyed, which is why expedited discovery is needed.
The first point seems really bad for OpenAI. On the fourth point, I’m not sure what Apple is alleging here — I think they’re alleging that Liu took an Apple internal engineering app with him over to OpenAI?
OpenAI has responded to Apple’s latest filing about the theft of confidential information, by filing its own rebuttal which again accuses the company of trying to stop employees leaving. According to Reuters, OpenAI is now also calling out Apple for being behind on AI.
[…]
“[Employees] can leave a company like Apple that has struggled to adopt AI and move to an exciting startup that builds innovative products,” says OpenAI in its new filing. “Apple may not like those choices. But it cannot claim those choices are unlawful, and it cannot use its own sloppy procedures to blame others for its own mess.”
On the face of it, the evidence Apple provided yesterday does appear damning. OpenAI doesn’t seem to be denying that confidential Apple information was used by the company, but rather claiming that the iPhone maker failed to properly protect it.
It sounds like there’s a lot of evidence against Chang Liu, but Apple is suing OpenAI.
Tesla has settled a wrongful death lawsuit over a 2023 crash in which a Model S on Autopilot slammed into a parked fire truck, killing the driver and seriously injuring his brother.
The confidential settlement, filed in California federal court, lets Tesla avoid a jury trial that would have put Elon Musk’s own Autopilot claims in front of jurors.
Logitech is facing a proposed class action lawsuit for not giving customers tariff refunds.
In April 2025, Logitech raised the prices on 51 percent of its portfolio, with some prices increasing by as much as 25 percent.
The complaint seeks to “recover monies that Logitech extracted from American consumers as offset for import tariffs that the United States Supreme Court has since declared unlawful, tariffs for which Logitech now stands to be reimbursed by the federal government. This is all while Logitech retained every dollar of the corresponding price increases it charged its customers due to the illegal tariffs.”
The MacVoices Live! panel examines a class action lawsuit over Apple Photos facial recognition, debating whether on-device processing, user consent, and biometric privacy laws justify the legal action. The conversation moves to TV tracking alternatives after TV Time’s shutdown, then shifts to Bending Spoons’ acquisition of Airtable, exploring the company’s growing portfolio, its business strategy, and the future of database tools in an era of AI-assisted coding development.
Apple’s lawsuit accusing OpenAI of obtaining trade secrets through former employees raises questions about corporate ethics, recruitment practices, confidentiality agreements, and OpenAI’s hardware ambitions. The panel considers the potential legal and financial consequences before examining Apple’s plan to end support for encrypted HFS+ volumes and what users should do with older drives.Panel members include: Chuck Joiner, David Ginsburg, Marty Jencius, Eric Bolden, Brian Flanigan-Arthurs, Jim Rea, Web Bixby, Jeff Gamet, and Mark Fuccio.
The launch of a new MacVoices merch store kicks off this session, including product choices, embroidery options, and listener-requested items. Chuck Joiner, David Ginsburg, Eric Bolden, Ben Roethig, Marty Jencius, Jim Rea, Jeff Gamet, and Guy Serle discussion then turn to Apple’s lawsuit involving Jon Prosser, the default judgment being set aside, and what Apple may hope to gain through discovery. The group closes by reacting to Apple Music’s most-streamed artists list and how streaming reflects changing musical demographics.
WebKit-based browsers on iOS and macOS can be configured to route all web traffic through proxy servers, which is how Tor browsers on iOS and our own Psylo work. We found three WebKit features — DNS prefetching, WebAuthn Related Origin Requests, and WebTransport — that bypass the configured proxy and send traffic directly from the device, which exposes the user’s real network. The same leaks also affect Apple’s iCloud Private Relay.
[…]
It must be noted that VPNs are not affected, since they tunnel the device’s entire network traffic at the system level.
[…]
We’ve addressed all three leaks in Psylo 1.3.1[…] Passkeys and WebTransport have legitimate uses, so both can be re-enabled at any time through per-silo toggles. This keeps Psylo leak-free out of the box, while users who need one of these features on a given site can opt in explicitly, with a clear understanding of the trade-off.
In an ideal world, we’d report the issues to Apple, they acknowledge the issue, and ship a fix in a timely manner. Unfortunately, our past experience with Apple tells us that reporting this issue would involve months of delays, inconsistent communication, and in some cases, denying the issue’s impact entirely.
We weren’t willing to wait months, or upwards of a year, sitting on bugs that undermine the core privacy guarantees of Psylo and iOS Tor browsers while saying or doing nothing.
[…]
Should we knowingly leave our users exposed while waiting for a system-level fix? We didn’t think that was acceptable or fair to our users. Or should we quietly ship our own mitigations without telling anyone? We didn’t think that was acceptable either. Security fixes deserve transparency, especially when they involve tradeoffs.
Soon after we published the blog, we sent a link to the blog and demo website to Apple in a security report to make them aware of it. Now the report is already in the status “We’re planning to address the issue you reported.” and a fix is planned for Fall 2026 🤯🤯🤯
On Thursday, a US District Court in Oregon ordered the US government to restart the process of approving wind projects. All new wind development in the US has been on hold since August 2025, when the Department of Defense (DoD) stopped participating in a process that allows it to compel developers to alter projects in order to limit their interference with radar equipment. The court ruled, however, that the DoD's national security claims did not allow it to opt out of a process that is legally mandated.
The Trump administration has made many attempts to block wind development, both offshore and land based. Its attempts to stop offshore wind included the same approach at issue in this case: Claim that drone developments mean that radar interference by wind turbines creates a national security risk. The courts were not sympathetic to this claim, including in cases where judges examined a classified report that the DoD was using to justify blocking offshore wind construction. As a result, the administration has turned to paying companies not to pursue wind development.
In parallel, the government was pursuing a similar approach for onshore wind. Here, a law lays out a process for the DoD to evaluate any problems posed by wind turbines and negotiate changes to planned wind farms with the developers. As laid out in the new decision, the government simply stopped participating in this process in August 2025, first by refusing to sign off on previously negotiated agreements, and later by refusing to draft agreements entirely. Eventually, it simply refused to participate in negotiations at all. This has brought a halt to all wind development in the US.
On Thursday, a US District Court in Oregon ordered the US government to restart the process of approving wind projects. All new wind development in the US has been on hold since August 2025, when the Department of Defense (DoD) stopped participating in a process that allows it to compel developers to alter projects in order to limit their interference with radar equipment. The court ruled, however, that the DoD's national security claims did not allow it to opt out of a process that is legally mandated.
The Trump administration has made many attempts to block wind development, both offshore and land based. Its attempts to stop offshore wind included the same approach at issue in this case: Claim that drone developments mean that radar interference by wind turbines creates a national security risk. The courts were not sympathetic to this claim, including in cases where judges examined a classified report that the DoD was using to justify blocking offshore wind construction. As a result, the administration has turned to paying companies not to pursue wind development.
In parallel, the government was pursuing a similar approach for onshore wind. Here, a law lays out a process for the DoD to evaluate any problems posed by wind turbines and negotiate changes to planned wind farms with the developers. As laid out in the new decision, the government simply stopped participating in this process in August 2025, first by refusing to sign off on previously negotiated agreements, and later by refusing to draft agreements entirely. Eventually, it simply refused to participate in negotiations at all. This has brought a halt to all wind development in the US.
Apple faces a $32.5 billion lawsuit over how its Photos app scans and stores faces. A federal judge cleared the case to proceed as a class action late last month, allowing millions of Illinois iPhone owners to join.
The case has been years in the making, and Apple has fought to shut it down at nearly every turn. Now it heads back to the court, with the company’s privacy practices on trial.
[…]
Court records have shown that the update applies to users with iCloud Photos turned on. Those accounts also need to use at least 10GB of storage and contain at least 5,000 photos and videos. Plaintiffs say all this amounts to collecting biometric data without consent, putting Apple squarely at odds with Illinois law.
Again, I find it odd that features are apparently gated based on the capacity of your iCloud account rather than the available storage.
The lawsuit accuses Apple of collecting biometric data without user consent in the Photos app, reportsThe Times. It is alleged that Photos uses facial recognition technology to scan individuals who appear in images, creating a “faceprint” for each person in the photo library.
After collecting enough samples, an algorithm is allegedly used to identify the iPhone user. That data is then stored on the iPhone within the Photos app.
I don’t see what the issue is here. My understanding is that it only uploads vectors after you’ve opted in by enabling iCloud Photos and manually assigning names. Also, the vectors don’t seem like the sort of biometric information that the law was meant to protect.
Assuming things are working properly, what should happen is that the people you have specifically named and the photos you have specifically verified sync their info via iCloud. However, the actual face detection for the rest of the photos is done on a per device basis and is not synced via iCloud, primarily for security/privacy reasons.
So, when you first set up a new device, it will pull down the names and info for the photos where you have identified a particular person, but then it still needs to go through the entire library on-device, identify the faces in each photo, and compare them to the synced information to tell which person is in which photo. So once it’s done, you should end up with mostly the same photos identified as each person, but each device still needs to do its own face detection locally.
Apple lawsuit against OpenAI has reached its first major procedural challenge, with the ChatGPT developer asking a US federal judge to dismiss allegations that it acquired or used trade secrets taken by former Apple employees.
OpenAI submitted its 31-page dismissal motion on Wednesday in the US District Court for the Northern District of California. The filing argues that Apple has not adequately identified protectable trade secrets or alleged facts showing that OpenAI misappropriated confidential information.
Apple filed the case on July 10 against OpenAI, its io Products hardware operation, former Apple Vice President Tang Yew Tan, and former electrical engineer Chang Liu. The complaint accuses the defendants of obtaining information connected to Apple’s product development, manufacturing, components, testing, and supply chain operations.
The allegations have not been proven, and OpenAI denies possessing or seeking Apple’s trade secrets. US District Judge Edward Davila must now decide whether Apple’s complaint contains enough factual detail for the litigation to continue.
OpenAI Challenges the Apple Lawsuit
OpenAI’s motion focuses initially on how Apple described the information it claims was stolen. According to OpenAI, the complaint relies on generalized product-development categories without identifying the protected information with enough precision.
Trade secret plaintiffs face a difficult balance at the beginning of litigation. Apple must describe the protected material sufficiently to establish a plausible legal claim, but revealing the material publicly could expose the same information it is trying to protect.
Sensitive details can later be handled under seal or through a protective order. At the dismissal stage, however, Apple must still provide enough information for the court to distinguish genuine trade secrets from general engineering knowledge, employee experience, or skills acquired through years of work.
OpenAI argues that Apple has not crossed that threshold. Its motion says the complaint fails to establish ownership of a protectable trade secret and does not plausibly allege that OpenAI acquired, disclosed, or used such information.
The filing also disputes the commercial premise behind Apple’s accusations. OpenAI says it is developing products that are different from Apple’s hardware and has no need or desire to use the iPhone maker’s confidential material.
That position does not settle whether information was taken. A company can potentially misappropriate trade secrets even when its eventual product has a different design. The court’s immediate task is narrower: determining whether Apple has alleged facts that could support its claims if those facts are later proven.
Apple Park | Image Source: Google
Disputed Access to Apple Information
Apple’s complaint centers partly on Chang Liu, who spent eight years working as a senior system electrical engineer at the company before joining OpenAI in January 2026.
Apple alleges that Liu retained an Apple-issued computer and accessed confidential technical information after leaving. It claims he exploited residual authentication access on multiple occasions to obtain internal documents while already working for OpenAI.
OpenAI presents a different explanation. It says Apple employees contacted Liu after his departure and asked him to help locate files needed for ongoing Apple work. The company published redacted messages that it says support this account.
OpenAI argues that Apple’s systems and policies allowed personal and corporate information to become intermingled through iCloud accounts. Former employees, it says, could retain access to Apple files without requesting it or realizing that access remained active.
The motion maintains that Apple cannot treat the foreseeable effects of its own access-management practices as proof that former employees intentionally stole data. Apple, in contrast, alleges that its records document repeated access to restricted information rather than an accidental discovery of lingering permissions.
These competing accounts are likely to become central if the case enters discovery. Authentication logs, downloaded files, device records, internal communications, and employment timelines could establish whether access was deliberate, what information was obtained, and whether it reached anyone working on OpenAI products.
A dismissal motion normally tests whether the complaint states a legally sufficient claim. It is not a trial, and the judge is not expected to resolve every factual disagreement using competing evidence at this point.
Tang Tan and OpenAI’s Hardware Team
Apple separately accuses Tang Tan, OpenAI’s chief hardware officer, of seeking confidential information from Apple employees during recruiting conversations.
Tan spent more than 24 years at Apple and worked on products including the iPhone, Apple Watch, AirPods, and iPod. He later helped establish io Products with former Apple design chief Jony Ive and other collaborators. OpenAI acquired the hardware company as part of its effort to create a family of devices built around artificial intelligence.
Apple alleges that Tan used confidential project names, retained internal materials, and encouraged job candidates to discuss unreleased components or bring physical parts to interviews. OpenAI rejects the claim that these interactions formed a coordinated effort to collect Apple secrets.
OpenAI says Tan repeatedly instructed employees that confidential information from previous employers could not be brought into its organization. It also offers an alternative explanation for an Apple offboarding document found in his possession, arguing that Tan retained it to help incoming employees comply with Apple’s departure procedures.
Apple’s position is that the document and recruiting communications must be examined alongside the other alleged conduct. It describes the events as part of a connected campaign rather than isolated employment or administrative issues.
The dispute comes during intense competition for engineers capable of developing consumer AI hardware. Apple alleges that more than 400 former employees have moved to OpenAI, although hiring people from a competitor does not by itself establish trade secret misappropriation.
A company must generally connect recruitment to the acquisition, disclosure, or use of protected information. OpenAI is relying heavily on that distinction, presenting Apple’s lawsuit as an attempt to respond to employee departures and its difficulties competing for AI talent.
Image Credit: Getty Images
Apple Seeks Immediate Restrictions
OpenAI’s dismissal request arrives shortly after Apple asked the court for a preliminary injunction. Apple wants restrictions imposed while the lawsuit proceeds, arguing that it could suffer harm if its confidential information is used during OpenAI’s hardware development.
The requested relief would prevent OpenAI and the individual defendants from acquiring, accessing, using, or disclosing the alleged trade secrets. Apple has also requested expedited discovery and forensic examination of relevant devices and accounts.
OpenAI says those restrictions are unnecessary because it does not possess or want Apple’s protected information. It has described Apple’s request as based on false information and has offered to cooperate in addressing specific concerns.
The two companies also disagree over their communications before the lawsuit. Apple initially said its concerns had been raised with OpenAI months earlier. OpenAI responded that Apple’s outside lawyers contacted the wrong person after confusing names and incorrectly described a conversation with OpenAI’s general counsel.
OpenAI says Apple did not present the specific accusations before filing the case and that the companies had previously discussed resolving any access issues. Apple has since provided additional information in support of its injunction request, including allegations involving other former employees.
These disputes have moved beyond ordinary court filings. OpenAI published messages and emails on its website to support its version of events, calling Apple’s lawsuit aggressive and poorly investigated. Apple has primarily presented its account through formal legal submissions.
Judge Davila could dismiss some or all of Apple’s claims, deny the motion, or allow Apple to amend its complaint with more specific allegations. Even a dismissal would not necessarily end the case if permission to revise the complaint is granted.
The next scheduled public test is an October 1 hearing covering Apple’s preliminary injunction and request for early discovery. That proceeding may determine whether OpenAI faces immediate limits on its hardware work before the underlying trade secret claims receive a full evidentiary review.
Apple is now seeking a preliminary injunction in its trade secrets case against OpenAI, which aims to stop the AI model maker from moving forward with developing an AI device or other products based on Apple’s technology. […] In a new filing, Apple is requesting expedited discovery from the accused OpenAI employees, senior systems engineer Chang Liu and Chief Hardware Officer Tang Yew Tan; OpenAI, and its foundation; and io, the device startup co-founded by Apple’s former lead designer Jony Ive.
Apple had claimed that they contacted OpenAI in February and that we didn’t respond. They now admit that their outside lawyers emailed the wrong person after confusing two Asian last names—only after we brought this to their attention. Apple also claimed they had a discussion with our General Counsel, which they now concede never happened. But they again hide the fact that they never raised the specific allegations in this lawsuit at that time, and that they in fact told us that they were “resolving any issues”. We then heard nothing for five months until they sued. In their latest filing, Apple tries hard to spin this sequence of events, but you can just read the emails for yourself here.
Apple accuses Chang Liu of accessing Apple confidential information after leaving the company, but only now admits that Apple employees reached out to him and asked for his help to locate this information (you can read the messages here). Apple now tries to shift the blame to “residual access”, but they also don’t disclose that this is a common issue with Apple which is caused by them failing to properly manage system access when people leave. What that means in practice is that former employees who are trying to do the right thing when they leave still have access to Apple files—despite not wanting them or even being aware of them.
What it does not even touch is the accusation that Chang Liu retained his Apple laptop, which seems to be proven by what OpenAI posted. Apple further says that Liu entered shared network folders after leaving the company, and did so to download dozens of confidential files.
Then, too, OpenAI ignores the specific further accusation that ex-Apple employee Tang Tan both emailed documents to himself and sought trade secrets from employees he was recruiting for the ChatGPT company.
What really matters is the claim that Apple never raised those issues in the lawsuit with them. OpenAI claims the emails prove this, but to me all the emails prove is Apple sent an email that said “please see the attached letters”. We don’t know what is in the attachments but I imagine those were the relevant issues they raised.
[…]
The fact that the lawyer emailed the wrong person is moot if they caught it and resolved it days later.
In OpenAI’s phrasing, it sounds like Apple’s attorney sent the entire initial letter of concern to the wrong person, and that’s why OpenAI never responded — because it wasn’t sent to the correct person (OpenAI general counsel Che Chang). That’s not what happened. The initial blockbuster “hey we think you guys are stealing our trade secrets and we want to talk to you about it” letter was sent to Che Chang. And Che Chang never did respond to Apple’s lawyers. That a mistaken email thanking Che Chang for a phone call that never happened (because that email was intended for another OpenAI employee) was also sent is irrelevant. I don’t understand why OpenAI is continuing to focus on this inconsequential mistake.
[…]
The iMessage transcripts that OpenAI provides at the bottom of their post do not contradict Apple’s claims at all. […] Apple also claims that Liu accessed confidential information, presumably in Box and definitely not in iCloud Drive, on five different occasions, up until 27 April 2026, over three months after he left Apple. These chat transcripts offer no explanation for that.
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To me, the most interesting response from OpenAI wasn’t their blog post, and was in fact released by Apple, as “Exhibit F” to one of their expert declarations submitted to the court last night.
The way Apple combines work and personal iCloud accounts left some employees able to access confidential documents after departing the company, reports The Information. The site spoke to more than half a dozen former Apple employees who were unknowingly left with access to sensitive content.
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Apple told The Information that the OpenAI lawsuit is unrelated to any files left available on iCloud and that it does not pursue legal claims against former employees who accidentally have Apple documents in their personal iCloud accounts.
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In a now-settled legal dispute, chip company Rivos claimed Apple intentionally lets former employees retain access to files “as part of a planned effort to generate a pretextual basis to sue the employees and their new employer for ‘stealing’ Apple material.” In the Rivos case, an employee was targeted for keeping work files in his personal iCloud account.
The documents included confidential material such as plans for product launch events. The former employees said they made no effort to retain access and unexpectedly found the files mixed with their personal iCloud data.
The problem reportedly grew from Apple’s practice of encouraging employees to connect their personal Apple IDs to company-funded iCloud storage.
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Apple also relied heavily on iMessage for workplace conversations and file sharing before rolling out Slack around 2019. Former employees could retain old iMessage conversations and attachments, while Apple could terminate their Slack access when they left.
If you use your personal Apple ID, you get a magic “Apple Work” folder in iCloud Drive. When you leave Apple, that “Apple Work” folder disappears. But any other files or folders that were shared with you that were outside that magic folder are still in your iCloud Drive, because it’s still your personal iCloud account.
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You still have the same Apple ID account, even though you no longer have an employee @apple.com email account. Overall, this is a humane way of dealing with digital identity. Your Apple ID account is you, the person, not “example@icloud.com”, one specific unique email address. And you, the person, may well have multiple email addresses — all of which can be associated with your one Apple ID account. That makes Apple IDs more nuanced and complicated than a simple mapping of one email address = one account. And it obviously makes access restrictions more complicated.
Yesterday, OpenAI released messages to show that Apple employees (with permission) retained access to the departing employee’s personal iCloud account so that they could access work files that were stored there. It’s just a mess that both the software and corporate policy encourage mixing everything in one account.
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