Ex-Intel Employee Jailed for Stealing Company Secrets
According to prosecutors, Pani, a former design engineer at Intel, downloaded secret documents from the chip giant back in June 2008 while supposedly using his final vacation time. Pani officially resigned from the company's Hudson, Mass. office in May, but had also gained employment with rival chipmaker AMD in March 2008, essentially stealing the documents while on both Intel and AMD payrolls months later.
In co-operation with the FBI, AMD later said that it was unaware of Pani's sensitive payload or his Intel employment. The FBI eventually determined that the company had no part in the actual theft, nor was there any evidence that Pani actually shared the information with AMD or any other company. The stolen documents were supposedly for his own use, the FBI said, so that he could advance his career in AMD or elsewhere by referencing it when needed.
"Pani had remotely accessed and downloaded top secret Intel documents from the [Intel] system between June 8 and June 10, 2008, when he was not working on projects for Intel and was purportedly on vacation," FBI Special Agent Timothy Russell of the Boston FBI cyber crimes squad wrote in an affidavit.
Intel reportedly said that after Pani's departure, it suspected he stole documents valued between $200 million and $400 million USD. Intel contacted the local authorities after obtaining substantial proof of the theft.
"The downloaded documents included mission-critical documents describing in detail the process Intel uses for designing its newest generation of microprocessors," the FBI affidavit alleged. "They included confidential and proprietary business information that also constitutes trade secrets."
This is just going to encourage employee theft while a disgusting scumbag gets off light to just do it again.
Because he didn't steal $200 million, he stole data to the value of, and he never got to use it.
Plus 3 years in the pen for this pampered office guy will be like 20 years on the chain gang when the gangstas and drug dealers have a party in his cell, he's gonna be walking like John Wayne for the rest of his life.
The one that got it worst was the owner of Megaupload..........
if he had used the data in any way he would be facing life in prison. But as it is he will be in jail for 1 year (out early to make room for real criminals), and he will never be able to find a job in the tech industry ever again.
you got it all wrong...this is different, much different
Over react much?
I love when these companies face problems trying to save money on hiring people with the h-1b visa. Not sure if these tech companies that mostly import employees are any better than just moving the whole company overseas. Hard to believe that it's not possible to build the same quality products without bringing in employees from other countries. It would probably cost a bit more, and that's why they do it. I say tax the company $30k more per year per h-1b visa. Level the playing field and bring money back into the government.
Enough of my rant, sorry.
Considering AMD cooperated with the FBI during their investigation, I'm sure if AMD had received any of the data, it would have been found. Also, AMD had no way of knowing for sure that he was still employed by Intel without him admitting to it. I'm sure the FBI looked at his employee file during the investigation. You're just too much an Intel fanboy to ever figure out how much information was actually collected during the federal investigation. I'm sure AMD knew he had worked for Intel as that would have been on his resume....but given that the federal investigator stated that AMD didn't know Pani was employed by Intel while working for AMD, I'm sure he listed his employment end date as prior to gaining employment with AMD.
trillions upon trillions, only our present and former congress members and aides know.
video included, "Indian charged with stealing Intel secrets"
New Delhi: An Indian software engineer in the US has been charged by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for stealing trade secrets of software giant Intel Corp.
Thirty-three year old Biswamohan Pani joined chip maker Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) after resigning from Intel.
The FBI reportedly found some sensitive documents at his home including design plans for future processor chips.
During a raid at Pani's home on July 1, the FBI recovered eight Intel documents and 19 CAD drawings. All the documents and drawing were classified as confidential, secret, or top secret.
He denied any charges of theft, but he surrendered his passport to US authorities. He claimed that he had taken the documents and drawing only to help tutor his wife Vandana Padhi in her new job.
He has not been arrested but case is being tried at the US District Court in Boston.
Bishwamohan's father Brundaban Pani, who lives in Bhubaneshwar, claimed that his son was innocent
"My son is innocent and the Indian government should help us to bring him back," Brundaban Pani said.
hire foreign, you get what you pay for including their morals and loyalty.
Well, if local employees aren't up to the mark, companies might stand to lose more than gain.
You know, being India, it's embarrassing every time something like this happens. However, your comment was just a cry-baby like. It's harder for us to get into companies like Intel, they place higher requirements on us.
Even colleges. If i had tried to join an undergrad course at an Ivy League college i'd have to have an almost perfect SAT score (2200 and above), with additional requirements.
So wtf is up with "OMG foreigners!".
Companies obviously do gain by hiring foreigners, that's why they do it. You shouldn't be embarrassed by what one Indian guy does. I was just surprised to see a white guy outside of management at Intel when I saw the picture on this article. A google search solidified my thoughts that most companies around here hire foreign engineers. An american citizen could have just as easily stolen secret information; that's not my point. Just raises an interesting fact. Have you ever been to Intel? Judging by the number of foreigners, your kids would be much more likely to be hired at Intel if they were born in India. Unless they're trying for management.
The thing we should be asking ourselves is "Why do we not have enough good engineers locally?" or "Why is it so much cheaper to bring in foreign engineers?". That's the real issue. I have no problem with foreigners, though you sound lame.
I seriously doubt that local employee are not up to the task and I'm a immigrant . While i had met a lot of lazy, laid back, Seat warmer, under performer Americans. I also had met a lot of Exceptionally bright ones I pretty much doubt that local Employee are not up to the task, they are just more expensive to hire than bringing in foreigners
Lol i'm more likely to be hired by Intel than my kids, i'm only 19 and a year into electronics engineering
I know, a lot of asians at intel.
It's embarrassing because right now the image India's giving of being a scandal/corruption hub is really quite sad, and what i'm reading is businesses and institutions don't like it here anymore because it's so difficult to get past red tape and politics. Then you have employees. Read about Adidas?
Anyway I can only hope my generation has more sense. It's a great country, sadly corruption has got the better of us.
True, never said americans were not up to it. Just said that it's not that all foreigners are undesirable.
it was something about intel atom he stole, useless anyway
From where I am I've never heard anything bad like that about India. I hear lots of bad things about other countries but not really anything bad about India except for the Caste system.