US judge orders engineer held in OpenAI case » Borneo Bulletin Online
SAN FRANCISCO, United States (AFP) – A former OpenAI employee accused of placing a recording device in the company's offices in San Francisco was ordered to stay in jail without bail on Monday. A federal judge said he might try to leave the country to avoid going to court.
US District Judge Alex Tse said there was a “significant” risk that Abdulrahman Alfozan, 35, would not appear in court. He rejected his lawyers' request to release him.
Alfozan appeared in court on Monday wearing orange prison clothes. He did not speak during the one-hour hearing.
He was arrested on October 9. If found guilty of secretly recording spoken conversations, he could face up to five years in prison.
In a document filed on Sunday, the US Attorney's Office said Alfozan, who had worked at OpenAI since 2025, had often communicated with a well-known person in Saudi Arabia.
The complaint against Alfozan does not accuse him of spying. However, US Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton suggested in a statement last week that the case could affect national security.
“The government's investigation is ongoing and may result in additional serious charges,” the new court document said. It added that the case was “a concern for the national security of the United States.”
“Whether the defendant wanted to record OpenAI meetings to make money by improving his own business opportunities, or to help a foreign government, or both, his conduct is criminal,” the document added.
The well-known person tried several times to persuade the engineer to join an artificial intelligence (AI) project in Saudi Arabia.
According to the court document, the person wrote in a WhatsApp conversation, “Saudi (Arabia) needs you more then [sic] the US.” Alfozan replied with “100,” a common way to show agreement.
Before his arrest, Alfozan bought a one-way ticket to Riyadh for October 12. Prosecutors said this was evidence that he might try to flee.
Alfozan's lawyer, William Pernik, disagreed. He said Alfozan had an interview for US citizenship scheduled for November 6.
Alfozan's wife and their baby left the United States on October 10, one day after his arrest.
The United States and Saudi Arabia do not have an agreement to extradite people, meaning they do not have a treaty requiring them to send people accused of crimes back to face legal proceedings in the other country.
‘Bigger case’
Alfozan's lawyers told the court that he was unlikely to flee because he was working towards becoming a US citizen. They also said he was willing to offer assets worth USD1 million as security in exchange for release on bail.
Prosecutors argued that he might gain even more money or other benefits by returning to Saudi Arabia.
“Once he leaves, there’s no getting him back, the case goes away, and that is why this is a bigger case,” Tse said in court.
The next hearing is scheduled for November 6.
The US Justice Department said last week that security camera footage showed Alfozan inside a restricted conference room. In the footage, he appeared to look behind a television, where a USB recording device wrapped in toilet paper had been placed.
The arrest and accusations come as countries and companies compete fiercely to lead the development of artificial intelligence. The Trump administration has pushed for AI to be called “superintelligence.”
Humain, a Saudi company backed by the government that works on AI, invested USD3 billion in Elon Musk's xAI shortly before Musk's space company, SpaceX, bought the AI division in February.
The division, now called SpaceXAI, announced last year that it was working with Humain to build a data center in Saudi Arabia with a power capacity of 500 megawatts.