Tesla sues two former employees over ‘Tesla Files’ data leak

Tesla confirmed that it is suing two former employees over the large data leak to a German media that was dubbed the “Tesla Files.”

In May, Handelsblatt, a German media company, published a series of reports that it called “Tesla Files“, which they claim was based on 100 Gb of data from “company insiders.”

The data that was leaked to the paper included information on over 75,000 Tesla employees.

Now, through a notice posted by the office of the Maine Attorney General, Tesla revealed that the leak came from two former Tesla employees who violated its security and data protection policies via Bloomberg):

A foreign media outlet (named Handelsblatt) informed Tesla on May 10, 2023 that it had obtained Tesla confidential information. The investigation revealed that two former Tesla employees misappropriated the information in violation of Tesla’s IT security and data protection policies and shared it with the media outlet.

Without saying in which court, Tesla confirmed that it sued the former employees over the breach.

The company claims to also be working with law enforcement over the issue:

Tesla also obtained court orders that prohibit the former employees from further use, access, or dissemination of the data, subject to criminal penalties. Tesla cooperated with law enforcement and external forensics experts and will continue to take appropriate steps as necessary.

Other than employee data, the media publication claimed that it also had information confirming internal problems with Tesla’s self-driving technology and the Cybertruck, but not much came out of the report.

Tesla said that it offered 12 months of Experian’s IdentityWorks credit monitoring and identity theft service to affected employees.