Apple Leaker Issues Apology: 'Profound and Expensive Mistake'

Last year, we reported that Apple sued its former software engineer Andrew Aude for providing journalists with confidential information about the company's future plans, including details about the Journal app, Vision Pro headset, and more.

As reported by 9to5Mac, the Superior Court of Santa Clara County on Thursday dismissed the lawsuit after Apple and Aude reached an agreement to resolve this matter. The court document for the case's dismissal does not provide any specific details about the agreement, but Aude issued a public apology on the same day.

In a post on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, Aude said leaking information was a "profound and expensive mistake."

Aude's full apology:

I spent nearly eight years as a software engineer at Apple. During that time, I was given access to sensitive internal Apple information, including what were then unreleased products and features. But instead of keeping this information secret, I made the mistake of sharing this information with journalists who covered the company. I did not realize it at the time, but this turned out to be a profound and expensive mistake. Hundreds of professional relationships I had spent years building were ruined. And my otherwise successful career as a software engineer was derailed, and it will likely be very difficult to rebuild it. Leaking was not worth it. I sincerely apologize to my former colleagues who not only worked tirelessly on projects for Apple, but work hard to keep them secret. They deserved better.

Aude joined Apple in 2016, to work on optimizing battery performance, and the company fired him in 2023 after learning of his wrongful disclosures. For more details about the situation, read our previous coverage of the lawsuit.