The case of Apple suing OpenAI for stealing trade secrets is revealing a data management vulnerability in Apple's own backyard. According to U.S. tech media, due to loopholes in internal policies, some former Apple employees were still able to access confidential documents, including product release plans, through their personal iCloud accounts after leaving the company.

This discovery adds a new technical dimension to Apple's legal battle with OpenAI. The root of the problem lies in Apple's long-standing practice of encouraging employees to link their personal Apple IDs with company-issued iCloud spaces - the company provides 2TB of iCloud storage and allows it to be combined with existing personal plans. Since iPhones support only one primary Apple ID for full iCloud access, many employees ended up storing both work and personal files on the same device and account.

Apple is not completely unguarded. In the late 2010s, it introduced a "Apple Work" folder to manage work files; however, internal information outside this folder could still mix with personal data such as photos and continue to sync after employees left. In other words, the wall that should have prevented former employees from accessing company secrets had a gap in its account structure - when a person left, the company's confidential information remained in the account, waiting to be accessed at any time. A lawsuit against outsiders has instead exposed Apple's own data governance weaknesses to the outside world.