OpenAI Turns Apple's Own Security Lapses Against Its Lawsuit

OpenAI wants Apple's trade secrets lawsuit thrown out, and its argument leans heavily on Apple's own IT practices. In an August 2026 motion to dismiss, OpenAI claims Apple never properly cut off departing employees' access to company systems, undercutting Apple's case that stolen information deserves legal protection as a trade secret.

The dispute traces back to a complaint Apple filed in July 2026. Apple accused OpenAI of orchestrating a scheme to extract confidential hardware information through former Apple engineers who later joined the AI company.

OpenAI's filing pushes back on two fronts. First, it argues Apple's complaint is too vague, pointing only to broad categories like component manufacturing, product testing, vendor relationships, and distribution channels rather than naming any specific secret allegedly taken.

Second, and more pointedly, OpenAI says Apple's internal security habits contradict its own claims of confidentiality. The motion cites a specific episode: a former Apple engineer named Chang Liu left the company, but an Apple manager stayed logged into his personal iCloud account and later reached out to him for help answering technical questions about ongoing Apple projects.

OpenAI's motion argues that if Apple treated the information casually enough to ask a departed engineer for help through his personal account, it cannot now claim that same information as a tightly guarded trade secret.

Apple's own internal review reportedly found that other former employees may have also been involved in, or at least witnessed, the alleged theft, a detail OpenAI includes as further evidence of Apple's uneven internal controls rather than proof of wrongdoing by OpenAI.

OpenAI frames the entire lawsuit as strategic rather than substantive. The company argues Apple is trying to slow down OpenAI's push into hardware while also masking its own struggles retaining talent and shipping AI features. OpenAI states flatly that it has no need for Apple's manufacturing or supply-chain secrets, describing its hardware ambitions as something built from scratch rather than derived from Apple's playbook.

The filing sets up a legal fight less about what was taken and more about whether Apple can prove the material qualified as protected in the first place. If a court agrees that lax offboarding undermines Apple's confidentiality claims, the case could stall before reaching questions of actual misappropriation. For now, the dispute remains an early-stage procedural battle, with Apple yet to respond to OpenAI's motion.