What Is The Jacobs Letter? Evidence In Uber-Waymo Case Going Public

A memo written by former Uber security analyst Ric Jacobs, which has become a primary piece of evidence in the company’s legal battle with autonomous car development company Waymo, is expected to be made public Dec. 13.

The 37-page letter from Jacobs was addressed to Uber’s deputy general counsel Angela Padilla and details the company’s “marketplace analytics” team that, according to Jacobs, existed for the sole purpose of stealing trade secrets from competitors.

The revelation of the letter—which was raised by the United States Department of Justice after the agency collected the document earlier this year as part of its own criminal investigation into Uber—raised questions about whether Uber knowingly withheld evidence that was relevant to its dispute with the Google subsidiary company Waymo.

The two firms have been locked in a dispute since February, when Waymo sued the ride hailing service for allegedly stealing proprietary information pertaining to Waymo’s autonomous vehicle technology. The case revolves around former Waymo employee Anthony Levandowski who, prior to departing from the company to found his own that would eventually be acquired by Uber, downloaded 14,000 “highly confidential and proprietary design files” from Waymo servers.

Those suspicions about Uber’s alleged theft of information seem to be corroborated by part of the letter from Jacobs, who alleges in his letter addressed to the Uber legal team that the company did in fact work to “acquire trade secrets” from competitors. Jacobs was fired by Uber in April.

Jacobs testified in federal court in San Francisco before U.S. district judge William Alsup on Nov. 28 regarding the letter. The former security analyst contradicted some of the claims made in the letter while on the stand, including the explicit mention of knowledge of attempts to steal information from Waymo.

The ex-Uber employee, who reached a settlement with the company after his firing and has agreed not to disparage the company in the press or in public, said that he didn’t read the letter—which was drafted by his legal team—before it was sent to the company.

Despite Jacobs backing down from some of the claims in the letter, the security analyst did confirm some information that could hurt Uber’s case. He testified that Uber established secret communications channels, including using encrypted and self-destructing messaging service Wickr, in order to destroy communication that might be considered sensitive. The practice was intended to keep the communication from harming the company in potential litigation.

Jacobs also testified that Ed Russo, a member of Uber’s Strategic Services Group, bragged about use of secret communications to set up secret meetings between top executives of competing companies. The Strategic Services Group also had two employees working “off the books” on the company’s self-driving car initiative.

After learning of the letter and hearing Jacobs’ testimony, Judge Alsup decided to put off the trial, stating, “I can no longer trust the words of the lawyers for Uber in this case” and “if even half of what’s in that letter is true it would be a huge injustice to force Waymo to go to trial.”

The trial, which was initially scheduled to begin Dec. 4, has been rescheduled to begin Feb. 5, 2018.