US sanctions 5 Chinese entities over ex-Google engineer’s AI trade secrets theft

The US State Department announced on Monday that it was imposing sweeping sanctions under the Protecting American Intellectual Property Act (PAIPA) on five Chinese entities suspected of stealing trade secrets from American companies.

The targets include Shanghai Zhisuan Technology, founded by former Google software engineer Ding Linwei, venture capital firm MiraclePlus and three related entities.

Ding was convicted of seven counts of trade secret theft in January. A federal judge subsequently acquitted him on seven additional counts of economic espionage, finding insufficient evidence that he knew or intended at the time of the thefts that his conduct would benefit the Chinese government. The theft convictions remain in place.