A Saudi national and OpenAI employee has been arrested for allegedly installing a hidden recording device in a management conference room at the company’s San Francisco offices to secretly record sensitive conversations.
Abdulrahman Alfozan, 35, was charged with using or attempting to use an electronic, mechanical or other device to intercept oral communications. He was arrested by authorities on October 9, 2026, the US Department of Justice (DoJ) said. Alfozan had been employed at OpenAI since July 2025, as an engineering manager. He has since been fired.
According to Alfozan’s LinkedIn profile, he graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a master’s degree in data science in 2025. He was previously employed at Meta as a senior systems engineer and became the founding engineer of Nash.
“Abdulrahman Alfozan allegedly hid a secret recording device in his employer’s executive conference room to secretly capture sensitive communications regarding the company’s super intelligence technology,” Kash Patel, director of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), said in a statement.
“Protecting America’s IS (super intelligence) innovation is essential to safeguarding our nation’s economic strength and national security, and the FBI considers this mission one of our highest counterintelligence priorities.”
According to the complaint, around September 30, 2026, OpenAI staff discovered a clandestine audio recording device inserted into a USB port on the back of a television in an executive conference room. The device was allegedly hidden in toilet paper and installed around September 28, 2026.
Closed circuit television (CCTV) footage obtained from OpenAI’s office showed Alfozan appearing near the executive conference room on several dates prior to the discovery, although he had no authority to access or participate in meetings taking place in the executive conference room.
The room, the complaint adds, was reserved for discussions involving “highly confidential technical, commercial and strategic information, including proprietary research, product plans and business development opportunities, as well as non-public information about OpenAI’s technical progress and strategic decisions, capabilities, priorities, government commitments and commercial relationships.”
Prior to installing the recording device, Alfozan also allegedly used an unspecified productivity tool to collect details about OpenAI building addresses, meeting rooms, meeting room capacities and schedules, locations of “leaders and directors,” and external partner meetings.
In addition to this, a chatbot account associated with Alfozan’s spouse was allegedly used to submit various prompts between September 24 and 30, 2026, related to the creation, customization, installation, audio recording, testing, obfuscation and remote access to a device. Some of these prompts are listed below –
- Building a Continuous Audio Recorder
- Customize Wi-Fi connectivity…
- Improve audio and live listening
- Encrypt SD card
The same chatbot account also allegedly submitted prompts related to the device, including its custom header and unique MAC address, between September 27 and 28, 2026. Then, on October 5, 2026, Alfozan entered the executive conference room and appeared to look behind the television in which the device was inserted.
The same day, Alfozan allegedly left a bag unattended in another room of an OpenAI building, which contained a second recording device, as well as his wallet and ID.
In a statement shared on
It’s unclear what exactly made the device “sophisticated,” but OpenAI told TechCrunch that it contained “advanced encryption, audio surveillance capabilities, and a data transfer mechanism designed to evade surveillance.”
“At this time, we have no indication that this individual inappropriately accessed or exfiltrated model weights, source code, or customer data,” the ChatGPT creator said. “Our security program is designed to protect against a wide range of threat actors, from insider risks to cybercriminals to nation states, and this case is an example of how AI can help address these sophisticated security threats.”
If convicted, Alfozan faces a maximum sentence of 5 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, followed by 3 years of supervised release.
The development comes as OpenAI fired three security researchers earlier this month after an investigation found they violated the company’s policies on handling sensitive information.
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