Sergey Aleynikov, a Goldman Sachs C++ programmer earning $400,000 a year, was arrested by the FBI at Newark Liberty International Airport on July 3, 2009 for copying proprietary high-frequency-trading source code in the days before leaving for Misha Malyshev's competing firm Teza Technologies, which had offered to triple his pay. A Manhattan federal grand jury indicted him in February 2010 on counts of trade-secret theft under the Economic Espionage Act, transportation of stolen goods under the National Stolen Property Act, and unauthorized access under the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act; he was convicted on the first two in December 2010 and sentenced in March 2011 to 97 months (8 years) in prison, three years' supervised release, and a $12,500 fine. On April 11, 2012, the Second Circuit unanimously reversed and ordered acquittal, holding that source code was not a "stolen good" under the NSPA and that Goldman's internal HFT system was not "produced for or placed in interstate or foreign commerce" under the EEA — a ruling that prompted Congress to pass the Theft of Trade Secrets Clarification Act of 2012 to close the gap. Manhattan DA Cyrus Vance re-arrested Aleynikov in August 2012 on state charges of unlawful use of secret scientific material and unlawful duplication of computer-related material; after a 2015 split verdict was vacated by the trial judge, the Appellate Division reinstated one count in January 2017 and the New York Court of Appeals affirmed on May 3, 2018, with prosecutors recommending and the court imposing a sentence of time served. His ordeal is recounted in Michael Lewis's Flash Boys.
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