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US sanctions five Chinese entities over ex-Google engineer’s AI trade secrets theft

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Source: South China Morning Post

The US State Department announced sanctions under the Protecting American Intellectual Property Act on five Chinese entities suspected of stealing trade secrets from American companies. They include Shanghai Zhisuan Technology, founded by former Google software engineer Ding Linwei, the start-up incubator and venture capital firm MiraclePlus, which seed-funded Zhisuan, two venture funds it manages (Beijing Qiji Chuangtan Phase I and Phase II) and a management entity owned by the first fund. Ding was convicted of seven counts of trade secret theft in January. A federal judge later acquitted him on seven additional counts of economic espionage, finding insufficient evidence that he knew or intended at the time of the thefts that his conduct would benefit the Chinese government. The theft convictions remain in place; Ding was sentenced on 1 September to 12 months minus one day and about US$198,000 in restitution. The indictment said he uploaded more than 1,000 Google files on its TPU and GPU supercomputing infrastructure to a personal account between May 2022 and May 2023.

Why it matters

Shanghai Zhisuan, MiraclePlus and the three Qiji Chuangtan funds face asset freezes, a ban on transactions with US individuals and entities, and restrictions on financial services and foreign-exchange licences.

When
19 Oct 2026
ID
WTA-N-2026-0333
Who
US State Department, Shanghai Zhisuan Technology, MiraclePlus; Ding Linwei
Authority
US State Department
Target
Shanghai Zhisuan Technology, MiraclePlus and three related entities
Action
sanctions under the Protecting American Intellectual Property Act
Status
imposed · Enforcement ledger

Summary by wheresthe.ai, from South China Morning Post. Checked against the source on 20 Oct 2026.

Read the original at South China Morning Post

Source copy: download the page text as saved on 19 Oct 2026 (PDF). Also held by the Internet Archive.

Cite this story

WTA-N-2026-0333: “US sanctions five Chinese entities over ex-Google engineer’s AI trade secrets theft.” wheresthe.ai, 19 Oct 2026. https://wheresthe.ai/d/us-us-sanctions-five-chinese-entities-over-ex-google-enginee-2026-10/ (source: South China Morning Post).

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