The company has identified \u201cthat a specific employee had planted it a few days earlier\u201d, adding: \u201cAt this time, we have no indications of this individual inappropriately accessing or exfiltrating model weights, source code, or customer data. The employee was terminated.\u201d<\/p>\n
Abdulrahman Alfozan, 35, a Saudi national, was arrested on 9 October, according to a press release from the US Department of Justice.<\/p>\n
Alfozan allegedly plugged an encrypted recording device, concealed within toilet paper, into a TV in an executive conference room in OpenAI\u2019s San Francisco headquarters on 28 September. Meetings in the room regularly covered confidential information, the FBI\u2019s press release said. A security sweep conducted two days later revealed the device, according to the justice department. Surveillance footage allegedly documented him walking around the meeting room in the days leading up to its discovery.<\/p>\n
According to the indictment of Alfozan, he submitted multiple prompts to an AI chatbot about internal details of OpenAI \u2013 \u201cbuilding addresses, meeting rooms, meeting-room capacities and calendars, \u2018leadership and exec\u2019 locations\u201d, according to the FBI.<\/p>\n
His spouse allegedly submitted multiple prompts to chatbots about \u201cbuilding, customizing, installing, audio recording, testing, obfuscating, and remote accessing a device\u201d, with specific inquiries about \u201c\u2018build[ing] a continuous audio recorder,\u2019 \u2018customiz[ing] wifi \u2026 connectivity,\u2019 \u2018improv[ing] audio and live listening,\u2019 and \u2018encrypt[ing] the SD card\u2019\u201d.<\/p>\n
The same chatbot account allegedly made inquiries that referenced unique identifiers of the device discovered in OpenAI\u2019s offices. After searching a bag left unattended by Alfozan in the headquarters, FBI agents discovered a second identical recording device, according to the indictment.<\/p>\n
If convicted, Alfozan faces five years in prison and up to $250,000 in fines. He has not made a public comment regarding the indictment.<\/p>\n
skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n Sign up to TechScape<\/p>\n A weekly dive in to how technology is shaping our lives<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n OpenAI said that it is \u201cgrateful to the agents and prosecutors who moved quickly to make an arrest\u201d and the investigation is continuing.<\/p>\n The company added: \u201cWe take protecting our technology, data, and people seriously, and as a matter of national importance. Our security program is designed to protect against a wide range of threat actors, from insider risks to cybercriminals to nation states, and this case is an example of how AI can help address these sophisticated security threats.\u201d<\/p>\n The incident adds to a growing list of privacy controversies for OpenAI. In June, an agent hacked<\/a> Australia\u2019s university healthcare system, and earlier this month, California attorney general Rob Bonta issued<\/a> an investigative subpoena to OpenAI over rogue hacking.<\/p>\n Last week, OpenAI announced it had terminated three safety researchers for allegedly sharing sensitive information in what the company called \u201ca breach of trust\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThey violated clear policies on handling sensitive information,\u201d a company statement read.<\/p>\n The trio of researchers called on the company to adhere to its own promises of transparency made in the wake of the autonomous hacking incidents.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Sam Altman, the OpenAI CEO, said in a recent interview that the world should accept \u201cbad things\u201d<\/a> happening with AI in exchange for its benefits. Around the same time, David Robinson, a top safety leader resigned<\/a> from the company, citing a \u201cbroken\u201d company culture and warning that AI developers are not \u201cbeing nearly careful enough\u201d with the rapidly advancing technology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OpenAI said it has found a hidden recording device in one of its offices and has referred the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":802228,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[554,733,4308,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-802227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/802227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=802227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/802227\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/802228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=802227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=802227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=802227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/1791974297_358_500.jpg\")
<\/p>\n