OpenAI employee arrested after listening device discovered in conference room

OpenAI said it found a "sophisticated recording device" hidden in one of its offices and used its own AI to identify who planted the device."We used our models to understand the device and where it had come from, identifying that a specific employee had planted it a few days earlier," OpenAI wrote in an X post on Tuesday. "We referred the matter to the FBI, and we're grateful to the agents and prosecutors who moved quickly to make an arrest. The FBI's investigation is ongoing and we will continue to support their work."

According to the DOJ, a complaint said that an OpenAI employee found a USB device surreptitiously placed on the back of a television located in an "executive conference room" of OpenAI's San Francisco office. The device was "concealed in toilet paper," the statement said.

The complaint further said that CCTV footage showed Alfozan near the conference room on multiple dates prior to the device's discovery.

The workers, Jasmine Wang, Mikita Balesni, and Tomek Korbak, published a letter disputing some of the claims circulating about their conduct. They wrote that they were concerned about the lack of clarity around their firings, as well as the way they might chill transparency at the company.