UPDATE 6/21/19: The ex-employee, Martin Tripp, is speaking out against the accusations. In an interview with the Washington Post, he described himself as a whistleblower and claims that Tesla has been engaging in bad practices at the company.
Tripp denies hacking the company's computers, but he did admit to leaking information to the press.
However, Tesla told PCMag that Tripp has been making false statements to the media about the company's business. The electric carmaker maintains that Tripp allegedly stole company trade secrets and transferred them to undisclosed third-parties.
Original story:
Tesla is suing an ex-employee accused of sabotaging the electric carmaker's business.
Martin Tripp, a technician at Tesla's Nevada factory, allegedly stole "several gigabytes" of confidential data and handed it over to unknown third parties, the company claims in a lawsuit filed on Wednesday.
According to the complaint, Tripp confessed when Tesla investigators confronted him last week with evidence of his misconduct, which involved hacking company computers to export the stolen data off-site.
"During the interview, Tripp also admitted that he attempted to recruit additional sources inside the Gigafactory to share confidential Tesla data outside the company," the lawsuit claims.
After news of the lawsuit emerged, Tesla's CEO Elon Musk tweeted on Wednesday: "There is more, but the actions of a few bad apples will not stop Tesla from reaching its goals."
Earlier this week, Musk alluded to the corporate sabotage in an email to company staff, remarking that a "long list of organizations" want to see Tesla die. Lately, the company has been struggling to reach its own production targets and facing bad press over the labor conditions at Tesla factories.
Tripp joined the electric carmaker last October as a process technician at the carmaker's Nevada factory, but Tesla claims he became disgruntled with his job, which sparked the retaliation. The confidential data he stole includes dozens of photos of Tesla's manufacturing systems.
Tesla also alleges that Tripp made false claims to the press. "For example, Tripp claimed that punctured battery cells had been used in certain Model 3 vehicles even though no punctured cells were ever used in vehicles, batteries or otherwise," the lawsuit said, in an apparent reference to a Business Insider article published this month.
Tripp could not immediately be reached for comment, so his side of the story isn't known.
Tesla's lawsuit against Tripp demands he pay damages to the company, and hand over access to all his electronics devices and online accounts in order to determine which trade secrets were allegedly stolen.