Apple iPad Engineer’s Security Breach Results in Termination

Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, recently told Gizmodo that because an engineer named A.J. showed him an iPad 3G for two minutes during the early morning hours of the iPad’s Wi-Fi only April 3rd launch, he was terminated from his position. The move was a breach in Apple’s tight security rules and therefore was given his walking papers by Apple’s HR department.

When asked about the engineer, Steve Wozniak had this to say.

I never knew him before. He resembled myself and Steve Jobs when we were that age, and my younger son who programs for NASA. He’s a kind of person I would always enjoy talking with. A.J. said that he had an email allowing his team to use the iPad outside of secure areas on April 3 (after midnight, which A.J. waited for). I was surprised but he had an email. If I’d known it was a 3G model, which I didn’t, I probably would have saved his job by telling him he can’t show it.

Apparently, Apple employees are held to such high standards that any leak of information, even to Apple’s own co-founder, Steve Wozniak, is seen as a violation of their no disclosure agreements which they have agreed to. This breach of secrecy is looked upon as a betrayal to the company.

[Gizmodo]