Apple has filed a lawsuit against former senior design engineer

Di Liu

, accusing him of stealing thousands of

confidential documents

related to the Apple

Vision Pro headset

and unreleased technologies before joining rival company Snap, the parent of Snapchat. The case, filed June 24 in Santa Clara County Superior Court, represents the latest in a series of trade secret theft allegations against former Apple employees.Liu, who worked at Apple for seven years developing the Vision Pro

augmented reality

headset, allegedly downloaded a "massive volume" of proprietary information to his personal cloud storage during his final days at the company. Apple claims Liu deceived them by stating he was leaving to spend more time with family and focus on his health, while secretly accepting a position at Snap, the parent company of Snapchat and maker of Spectacles smart glasses.

The alleged deception proved crucial to Liu's supposed scheme. Had he disclosed his employment offer from Snap, Apple would have immediately revoked his system access under standard competitor protocols. Instead, Liu retained access during a standard two-week notice period, during which Apple alleges he systematically copied sensitive files.Forensic analysis of Liu's company-issued laptop revealed he manually selected specific folders, renamed them, and uploaded them to personal cloud accounts, according to SiliconValley.com reporting on the lawsuit. Apple also claims Liu deleted files that could have revealed the full scope of his alleged theft.

The lawsuit seeks court orders forcing Liu to return all allegedly stolen materials and submit his devices for inspection to ensure no Apple confidential information remains. Apple is also pursuing unspecified financial damages for breach of contract and trade secret misappropriation.The stolen information allegedly includes product design details, testing data, supply chain strategies, and unreleased Vision Pro features. Apple argues the overlap between retained materials and Liu's current role developing AR products at Snap suggests intent to use proprietary information.Snap, not named as a defendant, stated it found "no reason to believe" the claims relate to Liu's current employment or conduct at the company.