In March 2024, Apple filed a lawsuit against Andrew Aude, who was once on the company’s payroll as an iOS software engineer. The lawsuit stated that the person had leaked confidential information on policies and products, particularly the cutting-edge Apple Vision Pro, to notable media outlets. The lawsuit has been dismissed, but at least the company got an apology from an ex-employee.
The now-dismissed lawsuit claimed that Andrew Aude had leaked more than half a dozen Apple policies and products
It appears that both Apple and Andrew have agreed to settle their differences, resulting in the case being dropped. As reported by 9to5Mac, public records revealed that the California-based titan is no longer going after its former employee, but it appears that one condition was included in exchange for dismissing the lawsuit, which was an apology. Sure enough, Andrew took to X and published the following post:
“I spent nearly eight years as a software engineer at Apple. During that time, I was given access to sensitive internal Apple information, including what were then unreleased products and features. But instead of keeping this information secret, I made the mistake of sharing this information with journalists who covered the company. I did not realize it at the time, but this turned out to be a profound and expensive mistake.
Hundreds of professional relationships I had spent years building were ruined. And my otherwise successful career as a software engineer was derailed, and it will likely be very difficult to rebuild it. Leaking was not worth it. I sincerely apologize to my former colleagues who not only worked tirelessly on projects for Apple, but work hard to keep them secret. They deserved better.”
— Andy Aude (@andyaude1) February 6, 2025
Andrew joined Apple in 2016 and worked on optimizing battery performance. Sadly, his career met an untimely end when he was fired in 2023 after the company found out that he was the source behind the information disseminated to media outlets. It is possible that Andrew felt that a public apology was his ‘get out of jail free’ card because it most likely would have been impossible for him to foot the legal bill. Apple, with its army of lawyers, would have made things severely difficult, and an apology may have been the only way that Andrew came out unscathed, though the same thing cannot be said about his reputation.
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