Ex-OpenAI Engineer Held in Custody as Saudi Royal Contacts Surface in Spy-Device Case

On Monday a U.S. court granted the government's request to detain a former OpenAI engineer accused of planting a recording device in an executive conference room at the company's San Francisco office in order to steal sensitive secrets.

In a new filing submitted Sunday, prosecutors said that Abdulrahman Alfozan, a 35-year-old Saudi national, was "in frequent communications via WhatsApp with a member of the Saudi Royal Family" throughout 2025 and 2026. The most recent exchange is dated October 5, 2026 — four days before his arrest.

Recruitment attempts

According to investigators, the royal contact told Alfozan that an artificial intelligence initiative was being launched in Saudi Arabia and urged him to join it. In May 2026 the individual wrote, "Saudi needs you more then the US!", to which the engineer replied "100," signalling agreement. The royal family member repeatedly tried to recruit him and asked when he would leave OpenAI; Alfozan said he would not do so until his stock vested.

Alfozan joined OpenAI around July 2025 on a base salary of $385,000 a year. Last week the DoJ announced his arrest: according to the department, he inserted a stealthy audio recorder into a USB port on the back of a television in the executive conference room to capture confidential conversations.

The preparation

Prosecutors say Alfozan modified the device to block data transfer with the television and encrypted the contents of its microSD card. To learn how to build a "continuous audio recorder," he used his wife's personal ChatGPT account. Before installing the device, he used an OpenAI productivity agent to identify which meeting rooms leadership and executives used and where they met external partners, and spent considerable time near the targeted room.

He is charged with using a device to intercept oral communications and faces up to five years in prison if convicted.

Flight risk

Prosecutors called Alfozan a flight risk, citing ample resources and support from a foreign government with no extradition treaty with the United States. It emerged that he had planned to fly to Riyadh with his wife and son on a one-way ticket on October 12; he was arrested three days earlier, but his wife and son had already left the U.S. The day before departure, his wife told the FBI her U.S. visa was expiring and that she and her son were moving permanently back to Saudi Arabia.

A search of his home and a preliminary review of his devices turned up electronic components similar to those installed in the office, photos of another concealed recorder and of TV input/output panels in OpenAI buildings, and a deleted note with links to devices from Seeed Studio — the same manufacturer whose hardware was found both in the office and at his residence. His browsing history showed access to a folder called "Saudi Gov Docs."

Prosecutors argued the conduct endangers innovation in Silicon Valley and U.S. national security.

Source: The Hacker News