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<\/p>\nAn OpenAI engineer has been fired and hit with federal charges accusing him of planting a listening device in an executive conference room at the tech giant’s San Francisco headquarters, according to prosecutors.<\/p>\n
OpenAI said it turned its artificial intelligence models into sleuths that allegedly identified 35-year-old Abdulrahman Alfozan as the human culprit in the bugging incident they say was discovered by the company last month.<\/p>\n
FBI Director Kash Patel alleged in a statement that Alfozan, a Saudi national, was attempting to “secretly capture sensitive communications about the company’s super intelligence technology.”<\/p>\n
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U.S. Attorney’s Office\/Northern District of California – PHOTO: Abdulrahman Alfozan, a now-fired OpenAI employee, is captured on hidden camera allegedly checking a listening device he is accused of planting inside a conference room at the artificial intelligence company’s San Francisco headquarters.<\/p>\n
OpenAI said that at this time “we have no indications of this individual inappropriately accessing or exfiltrating model weights, source code, or customer data.”<\/p>\n
“We take protecting our technology, data, and people seriously, and as a matter of national importance,” OpenAI said.<\/p>\n
The FBI said its investigation of the alleged incident is ongoing.<\/p>\n
The federal complaint was unsealed on Tuesday. An FBI affidavit in support of the complaint alleged that Alfozan was captured on a hidden camera checking the listening device he allegedly inserted into a USB port on the back of a television in a conference room.<\/p>\n
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U.S. Attorney’s Office\/Northern District of California – PHOTO: Federal charges against now-fired OpenAI employee Abdulrahman Alfozan were unsealed, October 13, 2026, accusing him of planting a listening device inside a conference room at the artificial intelligence company’s San Francisco headquarters.<\/p>\n
According to the affidavit, the conference room where the device was allegedly planted is frequently used by OpenAI executives to host internal leadership meetings where discussions were held on “highly confidential technical, commercial, and strategic information, including proprietary research, product plans, and business-development opportunities.”<\/p>\n
OpenAI reveals another hack into a government agency in Australia<\/a><\/p>\n The conference room is also used for “external briefings with government officials and business counterparts,” according to the affidavit<\/p>\n OpenAI said Alfozan had been employed as a member of the company’s product team since July 2025.<\/p>\n U.S. Attorney’s Office\/Northern District of California – PHOTO: Federal charges against now-fired OpenAI employee Abdulrahman Alfozan were unsealed, October 13, 2026, accusing him of planting a listening device inside a conference room at the artificial intelligence company’s San Francisco headquarters.<\/p>\n “The employee has been terminated,” OpenAI said in its statement.<\/p>\n Alfozan was arrested on Oct. 9 and made his first appearance in San Francisco federal court on Tuesday, according to federal officials. He did not enter a plea to a federal charge of using or endeavoring to use an electronic, mechanical, or other device to intercept oral communications.<\/p>\n According to the affidavit, OpenAI personnel first discovered the listening device wrapped in toilet paper on Sept. 30.<\/p>\n “We used our [AI] models to understand the device and where it had come from, identifying that a specific employee had planted it a few days earlier,” OpenAI said in its statement<\/a> posted on social media on Monday. “We referred the matter to the FBI, and we’re grateful to the agents and prosecutors who moved quickly to make an arrest.”<\/p>\n Security camera footage, according to the affidavit, recorded Alfozan near the conference room “on multiple dates prior to the device’s discovery, although he had no authority to access or to participate in meetings occurring in the executive conference room.”<\/p>\n![\"U.S.](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/us.abcnews.go.com\/e5a8e8f29a368991b555bd90d942e3af.jpg\"\/)
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