Apple cracks down on employees leaking to media

Apple Inc. warned employees to stop leaking internal information on future plans to the media and raised the specter of potential legal action and criminal charges, reported Mark Gurman of Bloomberg News.

Gurman reports, “The Cupertino, California-based company said in a lengthy memo posted to its internal blog that it ‘caught 29 leakers,’ last year and noted that 12 of those were arrested. ‘These people not only lose their jobs, they can face extreme difficulty finding employment elsewhere,’ Apple added. The company declined to comment on Friday.

“Apple outlined situations in which information was leaked to the media, including a meeting earlier this year where Apple’s software engineering head Craig Federighi told employees that some planned iPhone software features would be delayed. Apple also cited a yet-to-be-released software package that revealed details about the unreleased iPhone X and new Apple Watch.

“Leaked information about a new product can negatively impact sales of current models, give rivals more time to begin on a competitive response, and lead to fewer sales when the new product launches, according to the memo. ‘We want the chance to tell our customers why the product is great, and not have that done poorly by someone else,’ Greg Joswiak, an Apple product marketing executive, said in the memo.”

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