[아이뉴스24 김효진 기자] Engineers who stole trade secrets from major Silicon Valley technology companies, including Google, and handed them over to Iran were indicted.
On the 20th (local time), federal prosecutors in the Northern District of California announced that three Iranian engineers, including sisters Samane Ghandali (41) and Sorur Gandali (32), and Samane’s husband Mohammad Javad Khosravi (40), were indicted by a federal grand jury.
Sister Gandali is accused of transmitting hundreds of confidential files containing security and encryption technologies to external parties, including Hosravi’s account, through external messengers between 2021 and 2023 while she was working at Google.
When they were discovered by Google’s internal security system, they evaded surveillance by signing a false statement that they did not share confidential information with the outside world, while also filming the stolen files by displaying them on a computer screen.
It was discovered that in 2023, Hosravi uploaded confidential information related to Qualcomm’s semiconductor ‘Snapdragon’, which he worked for, onto his work computer and filmed it with Samane’s smartphone camera.
Additionally, it was discovered that they accessed and downloaded the stolen data in December 2023 while they were staying in Iran.
If the charges are confirmed at trial, they are expected to be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for trade secret theft, and up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine for obstruction of justice.
In a statement to US business broadcaster CNBC, Google said, “We discovered this through regular security monitoring,” and added, “We have strengthened our safeguards to protect confidential information and notified law enforcement immediately after discovering the incident.”
/Reporter Kim Hyo-jin (newhjnew@inews24.com)
