Story
September 5, 2026
Apple Says OpenAI Is Erasing the Trail as OpenAI Calls the Case a Mess
Apple portrays the case as a serious breach involving former employees and endangered evidence, while OpenAI argues that Apple’s own sloppy exit controls created residual access that it neither wanted nor used. The clash has also turned a once-celebrated partnership into a public fight over the future of AI hardware.
The rupture is striking because Apple and OpenAI were recently allies. In June 2024, Sam Altman appeared in Cupertino as Apple unveiled plans to integrate ChatGPT into its products. But as OpenAI moved deeper into consumer hardware — including its planned acquisition of Jony Ive’s io startup — cooperation gave way to litigation. Altman has said he was personally dismayed by the turn, calling himself “a mega Apple fanboy” while insisting OpenAI does not want another company’s intellectual property.1
Apple’s lawsuit, filed in July, centers on former Apple executives Chang Liu and Tang Tan, now at OpenAI. Apple alleges they retained or sought confidential information about unreleased products and technologies to aid OpenAI’s hardware ambitions. The company sought a preliminary injunction that would bar the defendants from accessing, acquiring, using or disclosing the material while the case proceeds.2
The dispute intensified after Apple said OpenAI turned over a MacBook used by Liu only on August 21. Apple’s subsequent inspection allegedly found that Liu downloaded a confidential circuit schematic and used it in OpenAI work. It also cited messages discussing the need to “restore” and then “start using” Apple-owned devices after an internal investigation began. Apple says those exchanges make expedited discovery necessary because logs, metadata and other forensic records can be lost or overwritten.3
OpenAI rejects the premise. It says Apple left former employees with residual system access because of its own poor offboarding, and contends Liu did not access information improperly or for an improper purpose. In a public broadside accompanied by emails and iMessages, OpenAI called Apple’s accusations “careless, aggressive, and oddly personal,” arguing that Apple is now trying to recast an access-management failure as theft.2
That leaves the court with two sharply different narratives: Apple says it is racing to preserve evidence of a trade-secret breach; OpenAI says Apple is using a messy employee exit process to obstruct a competitor it fears.