Apple has sued tech YouTuber Jon Prosser for allegedly leaking iOS 26 information to the public ahead of its reveal at WWDC in June.
Apple sued Prosser and another individual, Michael Ramacciotti, in Northern California District Court yesterday, accusing [PDF] them of misappropriating trade secrets and a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act for conspiring to break into a development iPhone in the possession of an Apple employee in order to take a video of iOS 26 (then called iOS 19) in action.
The lawsuit alleges the theft resulted in a trio of iOS 26 videos from Prosser. Cook & Co not only wants damages for the theft, but also to force Prosser and Ramacciotti to destroy any confidential Apple information still in their possession.
Apple does not know the full extent of its trade secrets and confidential information that Defendants viewed or retained
“Apple does not know the full extent of its trade secrets and confidential information that Defendants viewed or retained,” Apple said in the lawsuit. “[The device] contained a significant amount of additional Apple trade secret information that has not yet been publicly disclosed.”
Fearing additional secrets may be published, Apple wants to quash the possibility now.
With friends like these …
While how the information was obtained may not directly affect the charges against Prosser and Ramacciotti, it doesn’t change the fact of how egregious the whole affair allegedly was.
According to the suit, Ramacciotti was in need of money, and had a friend named Ethan Lipnik who worked at Apple as a software engineer on the Photos team – two facts that Prosser was aware of when he allegedly offered to pay Ramacciotti to break into Lipnik’s development iPhone and show Prosser what the version of iOS running on the device looked like.
Ramacciotti, who frequently stayed at Lipnik’s home, allegedly used location-tracking software to determine when Lipnik was far enough from home to be gone for an extended period. During such windows, he allegedly used the opportunity to obtain the passcode and access the device.
“Ramacciotti made a video call to Mr Prosser and ‘showed iOS’ on the Development iPhone,” the lawsuit alleges. “He demonstrated several features and applications, disclosing details of the unreleased iOS 19 operating system.”
According to the lawsuit, Apple learned the full details of the incident from an audio recording sent to Lipnik by Ramacciotti, admitting to the crime. Lipnik provided the recording to Apple after it was notified by an anonymous individual who had seen the leaked content and recognized Lipnik’s apartment in the background of the call.
The audio recording – sent by Ramacciotti after Lipnik found out the data had been stolen – reveals the entire scheme, Apple claims in the suit.
Unfortunately for Lipnik, Apple said he bore some responsibility for the leak because he hadn’t properly secured his development device, “according to Apple’s policies.” Because of this, Lipnik was fired.
Lipnik didn’t respond to questions for this story. Nor did Apple or Prosser.
The YouTuber did make a public statement denying Apple’s allegations in a post on X, however, saying he was looking forward to speaking with Apple about the whole affair.
“For the record: This is not how the situation played out on my end,” Prosser said. “I did not ‘plot’ to access anyone’s phone. I did not have any passwords. I was unaware of how the information was obtained.”
Prosser said he had evidence to prove he was unaware of how the data was obtained, and provided a screenshot of a text conversation, presumably between him and Ramacciotti, to support his claims. Apple, of course, claims to have its own evidence to support its allegations, meaning this one might be headed to court. ®
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