The Mercedes-Benz F1 operation is taking legal action against one of its own engineers, who was planning to join Ferrari in 2016. Ben Hoyle was due to move to Ferrari when his Mercedes contract expires at the end of 2015. However, Mercedes is now seeking to stop him working at Ferrari until the end of 2016 because, it says, he has had access to data that will have given Ferrari an advantage if the Italian team had access to it. This is clearly a complicated story.
Hoyle joined Mercedes AMG High Performance Powertrains in Brixworth in May 2012, after spending two and a half years as a calibration engineer at nearby Cosworth, working on its F1 engines in 2010 and 2011. Prior to that he was employed at Pi Research after beginning his motorsport career with the Prodrive-run Subaru World Rally Team.
His role at Mercedes was “Performance Application Team Leader”, an important role that involved applying lessons learned from racing to develop new engine management strategies and calibrations. The performance of the current generation of F1 engines is largely dependent on engine management strategies as there are so many different ways in which the power can be managed with the ICE, the turbocharger, the MGUK and MGUH units and the Energy Store. It is clear that Ferrari reacted very quickly when it realised that its engines were not as competitive as hoped, early in 2014 when the new formula began. Hoyle informed Mercedes in May 2014 that he would be leaving when his contract expired at the end of 2015. As a result of this, he was reassigned to a different department at Mercedes in April this year, working on DTM activities. He was then denied all further access to F1 material and his access to F1 areas was similarly denied. Mercedes claims that Hoyle then gained access to and saved sensitive files that included a report from the 2015 Hungarian Grand Prix, plus mileage and damage data, in addition to files containing the code required to decrypt the data. Mercedes also says that Hoyle removed documents containing confidential F1 information “after employing expert forensic computer analysts” and searched for and saved information stored on HPP’s servers, including very detailed data about engine performance. Mercedes claims that this was saved on various different devices.
The company also claims that Hoyle took a series of measures to hide the data he had saved including filling up his disk in order to overwrite deleted material. Mercedes says that this is a defensive step and not in any way an attack on any other team.
The company is demanding that all documents be returned and that its legal bills be paid by Hoyle. It has also applied for a ruling that would stop Hoyle from working for Ferrari until the end of 2016. Whether this develops into a bigger story remains to be seen. The request for a delay in Hoyle’s employment suggests that Mercedes knows how important he is and wants Ferrari not to have access to him for another year… It remains to seen whether a judge will agree to such a penalty.
joeblogsf1 
Surely if it’s discovered his employment at Ferrari is/was conditional on him providing such data, the judge should block it?
A very big if
the IF is the important part there Optimaximal. And It would have not only to be discovered, but also proven beyond doubt. I would be quite surprised if any solid evidence of that could be brought forward.
Looks like Mercedes has made a bit of a splash with the news, saw it on BBC earlier.
If Ben gave them notice that long ago, why not keep him away from sensitive stuff, or are we to assume that he downloaded without permission, which is inferred in the report?
Let’s see what comes of it.
Surely they would be better going through the FIA than going through the normal courts? Should we assume they have already tried the FIA route? I can only think that something alerted Mercedes, and then they examined logs, hard drives etc. If you believe Merc’s side of this, and we haven’t heard the other side, this does look, like industrial espionage, but I am no expert in law.
Perhaps they feel that real law is different to FIA law.
Nice to know if you at Mercedes that they spy on you. I can understand why Merc does that and why it is taking action but the risk is that this just ends up a big mess with two sides of the story and perhaps some doubt created in the minds of remaining employees.
All teams now have very advanced security systems. These are necessary.
Doesn’t sound like they work very well…
I think they do work fine Posimosh – afterall, they bring all this evidence to court now to show what they cought him on. And off course it also helps warn off other employees that they will take matters to court.
All technically advanced employers can and do “keep an eye” on what their employees do. They have to. For example, in many regulated spheres, they have to keep _all_ emails in to, out of, and within the company no matter how trivial or important. Just in case you’re discussing a third party that could issue a request for ‘any information you hold on them’ – a basic requirement of just about every Data Protection legal regime.
Basically, whilst your on company time and/or using company equipment, you should assume the company can see what you’re doing. To think or act otherwise is simply naive.
having the ability to review activity that’s taken place on your systems is not spying, its a bare minimum of technical security
Every employee at Mercedes is probably made very aware of the security in place and the rules of employment, including contractors such as the caterers and cleaners. This employee would have been more aware than most given the precautions they had taken to move him away from the F1 projects.
Even my company (medium size, medium tech) can look into everything I do while using my company laptop and company phone. Technically I shouldn’t be reading this blog, but I take the chance they’re not that interested. But if I ever do anything wrong from a security/legal aspect and they need to investigate, I’m fully aware I’m not clever enough from an IT security aspect to hide anything from them.
If there is truth to the claims by Mercedes (and I’m inclined to believe them given how public they’ve made it), then the employee was pretty naive, or desperate. Maybe his payday move to Ferrari was based on his own over-promise of his knowledge/usefulness?
I’m expecting this to be as reasonably straight forward as Mercedes claim. However, for those wanting a more shady scenario, maybe Mercedes left their security open enough to allow the employee some access to certain ‘restricted’ data that had, in isolation, limited use and they ultimately could risk leaking. Once he employee fell into the trap it gave Mercedes ammunition to legally negotiate a delay to his employment by Ferrari. Another year sidelined is a lifetime in F1 engine development. All just speculation of course.
If one uses the company’s computers, it’s company business and no employee should expect anything they do on one to be private. I presume all transactions can be traced.
If it’s proven Ferrari had a hand in attempting to obtain this information, it could cost them a lot of money. I wonder what Ron Dennis is thinking.
If if if
But wasn’t Ron the one who decided to rat himself out ? (All beceause Alonso rubbed him the wrong way ?)
I guess you’ll have to wait until Joe spills the beans at a later date. Eh Joe?
That was until he ate some humble pie and hired him back for the stellar 2015 season, totally worth it.
As if Ferrari International Assistance would fine Ferrari $100M !
Right now it’s not a love affair…
Only McLaren have to pay fines for espionage. It’s a part of the Concord Agreement. 😉
Ferrari would simply veto it, anyway!
While I am no expert on employment law, there seems to be two issues here.
1) The information he takes with him upon leaving his current employer.
If he gave notice in May 2014 to leave 17 months later at the end of 2015, then if he was considered a key employee he should have been put on garden leave.
However to reassign him to a lesser role where he should not have had access to sensitive data may be considered naive as he would still be able to talk to associates and it would be interesting to know whether he was given specific, written instructions as to what data he could and could not access.
2) Anybody who leaves one organisation to join a rival will always sell themselves as the right person for the job. That’s how interviews work.
Ferrari may think that they can gain new and potentially vital information from this ex-Mercedes employee and he may have made promises that he genuinely believes, but as is often the case, the reality is usually very different.
Any information he brings, however obtained, will only be of limited use. What matters is that he understands the systems and formulae to make his knowledge work for his new paymaster and no amount of allegedly stolen data will achieve that.
anyway if he’s that good why let him go?
graham: “anyway if he’s that good why let him go?”
It’s called a resignation – he can choose to leave his employer any time (pending appropriate contact terms).
It’s very hard for an employer to not ‘let him go’ unless he signed a remarkably unusual contract.
Isn’t there a spot in North Wales,( Portmeirion ), set aside to keep
people like this, preventing them from divulging sensitive information?
Gwyntanamo Boyo?
LOL!
Rolling on the floor laughing!!
Good one 🙂
Too many vowels.
But the Portmeirion travelogue wouldn’t look the same in a 300SL rather than a Lotus Seven… On the other hand the sinister guardian bubbles would wear a three-pointed star very nicely.
Always one of my favourite series, and of course Rosberg is not a free man!
It will be interesting to see what legal sanctions may be applied to prevent transmission of knowledge in a person’s head, rather than unauthorised possession and transmission of data not owned by that person, which I presume might be as a result of theft? Dirty old place the automobile industry!
You cannot impose sanctions on what is in someone’s head, but you can if they are doing naughty things. However, we must await to see what a judge makes of all these claims before passing judgement. The only thing I don’t really understand is if this guy is a wizard software type, surely he must understand that there is spy software employed to stop you doing things, or at least to at least track down those who go where they should not be going.
What I don’t understand is how they know it was him doing the act, they will need to have either located the files in his home or somewhere linked to him or have got the act on film, otherwise it is very easy to frame someone by using their credentials to log on and commit the act.
I have set up an IT system for a supplier to f1 teams and even there the security was intense. Each and every access to every file was recorded, date, time, user, PC, and what action they took. All retained for 12 months. This could be tied up against the ceiling mounted CCTV so you knew exactly who was at a workstation at a given time. Using someone else credentials was instant dismissal.
This is not unusual. Recruitment companies often go to extreme lengths to prevent data leaving the building for similar reasons.
If Mercedes say they know he took the data I’d be inclined to believe them.
>>otherwise it is very easy to frame someone by using their credentials to log on and commit the act.<< Precisely, in a tech smart field of employment that is easily done. We should not assume one way or the other, a frame up by Merc or wrong doing by the employee. But restraint on this individuals right to work with no wrong doing, would be wrong. I do note the remedy requested by Merc is he gets to sit out 2016, which supposedly is when we get new rules and not something like a lifetime ban and scorched earth. If I was a judge I might be tempted to grant it on the grounds that Merc pays his "gardening leave". That way no one wins. "gardening leave" has a purpose, to time out the restraint on the right to work. Merc by not making him work his time out "in the garden" have some culpability. But having first hand experience of this, employers can be the bad guys with key technical staff they do not wish to loose. Companies are made of people and egos get bruised when staff leave and then companies do irrational things.
I will count on Joe to keep me informed and dig up the facts and report a judges conclusions. Not what a press release thinks it all means. That is the role of an effective Journalist, report the facts and provide a balanced opinion with relevant background information.
/You cannot impose sanctions on what is in someone’s head/
But you may impose sanctions on using confidential information that came out of someone’s head, I believe.
If, of course.
I get the impression from the whole affair that Mercedes bringing this to court has a lot to do with their wish to bar him from working for a competitor as long as possible.
In that view, it also makes sense they have not sent him on gardening leave earlier, because after the guardening leave they would not have any means of doing so anymore (because they already put him “on hold” for a time).
Will be interesting to see how this one pans out.
I remember in 1972 a mechanic left JPS Team Lotus to go to work for Yardley McLaren and Lotus accused him of taking a box of special spark plug wrenches and track notes from the 1975 US Grand Prix at Watkins Glen written on the back of a hamburger wrapper.
I remember in 1972 a mechanic left JPS Team Lotus to go to work for Yardley McLaren and Lotus accused him of taking a box of special spark plug wrenches and track notes from the 1972 US Grand Prix at Watkins Glen written on the back of a hamburger wrapper.
I can’t see how a judge can prevent him to spend holidays in Emilia-Romagna without putting him in jail.
Bernie has is winter story now.
After the McLaren Ferrari copy shop fiasco I honestly can’t believe that an intelligent emoyee would try to copy and steak data. They must know teams have pretty secure systems these days.
If you offer to take data with you to a new employer then surely by definition you are untrustworthy…. Hence compromising your employability.
Let’s see how it pans out, I hope its a storm in a tea cup and fizzles out. We don’t need another ‘scandal’ .
The weight of a billion dollar company coming down on an individual who notified the company 17 months ago he intended to leave.
Regardless of the worth of the data at play it hardly seems fair, especially when they threaten to go after legal costs. What individual whether guilty or innocent, can withstand those implied costs?
It’s a bargaining point
The data itself will be near worthless, it almost always is without stacks of context and it all reads to my (solicitor) wife as being a classic case of weaponising employment issues using IP transgressions. Apparently it’s becoming more and more popular as tech-sector employers see their valuable employees jumping ship more and more often despite increased training investments. In this case she reckons it’s simply to delay his employment.
Mercedes have started aggressively by publicly tainting his integrity and telling him they’ll expect all legal costs to be paid for if it goes to litlgation. Litigation would take months and months to prepare and bring to court anyway so it’s likely an empty threat. Pretty nasty stuff but also pretty standard from what the Mrs says.
The thing that makes it so obviously an employment delay tactic is this – Would a software aware team-leader expect to be able to copy files without an activity log tracking his efforts? Of course not.
Interesting point. I was kind of wondering how he would be able to access files he shouldn’t have access to as that can be easily locked down. If he actively circumvented protection he is clearly guilty. If he downloaded forbidden files onto an external USB drive, again I would think he is guilty (although I would assume he could make a case if the files were not protected or he was not given any instructions by Mercedes to not access them). You would think most people in his position would assume with such highly sensitive information, there are logs that track all activity, although some people really are completely ignorant to what computers can do quite easily.
Never thought of Mercedes just using dirty tactics to avoid one of their employees joining a competitor. In which case I hope the judge will ask for some evidence of the transgressions.
Interested to see what comes of it. I can see the incentive for an employee to try and gain favour with a new company by bringing over information. But I would have thought after spygate that all of them would think really hard about what they can get away with.
I think you might be overthinking this
If (and it’s an “if” the size of a steroidally-enhanced elephant) he really managed to download stuff onto a USB device then Merc’s IT security people need to be sent to the camps for re-education.
IF (and it is a very big IF at the moment) he’s been caught with the proverbial hand in the till, then I expect he’ll kop it. But I also assume Mercedes must have data to prove this before the go public? Otherwise there will be a lot of egg on Mercedes faces post the court case. A very interesting scenario, this one.
It happened to me several times in my career, thank god not at this level of public awareness. Looking back on it now and remembering a little bit of the stress and what happened to my life and the sheer terror of the situation, well lets just say I’m sweating a lot. I have every sympathy for the poor guy and hope there is a reasonable escape route out of the Industry because that is the only answer. Tell Mercedes and Ferrari to live long and prosper and disappear into another career far,far away from it all.
He be fine. he will just go to Hass for a couple of years.
In a sense it does not matter if he has any data since the important stuff about how the engine management algorithms work would be in his head anyway. I always assumed that Jock Clear was sidelined for 12 months by Mercedes because he knew a lot about how the power unit worked. Short of using a sci-fi brain wiping ray, apart from the gardening leave stipulation there is little Mercedes can do. By the way, I assume Jock is soon to arrive at Ferrari?
Jock left Merc after the summer break and starts in Maranello on January 1, after six months work and six months gardening leave.
Jock presumably behaved himself in his last 6 months working for Mercedes.
The issue does not appear to be what was in his head, but that he accessed files he was not supposed to (how he was prevented from doing so I don’t know, i.e. was he just told not to, was it just implied or did he circumvent protection). I think what is in your head you can take to a competitor (i.e. why there is gardening leave which means one’s knowledge is obsolete), but once you take actual physical files (be it on a USB drive) you are breaking the law.
Allegedly
“Im Stuttgart, ve haff vays uf dealing wiz zis schwein!”
Happens in all areas. A few years ago we had a chap who dumped a laptop in a duck-pond when confronted with similar circumstances….
and my neighbour realising he might be in similar trouble removed the laptops hard drive and microwaved it for some time before replacing it (on cooling down). I dunno if that works
One would think that Ferrari doesn’t want him anymore if the allegations hold any truth.
The problem with the digital world is that it’s all based on logins. Passwords, keycards and even fingerprints can be stolen (depending on the systems used – fingerprints seem safe but if they’re just a comparison of one .jpg file with another… that’s a whole other thing than checking if the finger is actually a finger by checking if it has a heartbeat and temperature one would expect).
From the outside the Guy seems stupid.
Perhaps you don’t know the full story.
You may know better than I do but I severely doubt that any reasonable finger print scanner would use JPEG as the mechanism for comparing finger images – JPEG removes high frequency content from images – thus it blurs the edges of any shape – e.g. lines in a finger – whilst preserving the general colour and intensity gradients across the image as a whole.
The security Guy (hacker) I talked to actually said that some systems only use a ‘comparison of two images’ which makes it possible to use some office tape to get a fingerprint of a cup of coffee.
However, apart from the drama for the man and hi family… Interesting story.
There are very few finger print security systems in place that actually save the finger print. Most systems use an algorithm to reinterpret the scan. This is due to the legal ramifications of storing the finger print. Of course, the algorithm is theoretically reversible. But more importantly finger prints, like snowflakes, like current DNA technology, can only narrow the field and not be 100% accurate. Also, staff are not very good at logging out of systems when they leave their desk, leaving systems accessible to anyone who chances on a PC that is still logged in. Plenty of reasons to create doubt. Of course MB might want to re-employ this dude at some time….
One thing that does seem a little strange to me, if he puts in his notice, why then didn’t Mercedes just stick him out on gardening leave for 6 months. One reason I can think of very quickly, is that he could very easily meet up with his mates from work and talk shop as we all do, and I guess Mercedes has no real control over that or what was talked about outside of the office.
As for the downloads, given what type of work he did and knowing a little about corp. security, he would have known about the audit checks that can be done, so a very silly move on his part, but then again, we need to wait and see what he actually down loaded, and the Judge would be best placed to comment on that. It could be nothing relating to what he did – before, and Mercedes are just throwing some mud against the wall to colour up the situation.
Mercedes pay well and so does Ferrari, so why the move, unless Ferrari are offering a heck of a lot more, or a move up the corp. ladder. Sometimes the Italian life style is more enjoyable than rural countryside of England. Food might be a bit better, but then to enjoy it he needs to speak the language and maybe he does.
I think Mercedes has made a mistake here. They should have forced him out on to gardening leave, but I think they didn’t rate him that highly to suggest it, and therefore just moved him internally. Big and bad mistake on their part
I will come up with a more reasoned response after fantasising on the concept of a years payed gardening leave for a wee while…
There are many ways to make absolutely sure that something like this doesn’t happen at all. Mercedes seem a bit sloppy at times.
The minute that he gave his notice he should have been put on gardening leave. That Mercedes first mistake. If the gentleman did, in fact, do what the legal action states; did he feel that he was treated wrongly by Mercedes and he did it to get back at them? There’s a reason that he gave his notice and it will come out eventually.
The gentleman’s skill set is his real value. By the time that he would be hired by Ferrari (if in fact he was headed there), the information that he supposedly took would be, for the most part, obsolete.
The real issue here is that Mercedes want this gentleman to sit out the 2016 season because he’s good at his job and Mercedes don’t want his going to another team (especially Ferrari) to help them in trying to beat Mercedes.
If Mercedes AMG Petronas is such a good place to work, why is their talent leaving? Yes, the other teams are always trying to poach personnel from the other teams but the personnel turnover seems very high at Mercedes. If a person isn’t always excellent in their job, are they treated extremely harshly? Is perfection the only thing that’s tolerated? I think so but it’s probably that way at all of the teams.
Mercedes don’t want this issue to go to court and are using the paying of legal fees as a deterrent. There will be some sort of irreversible damage done to the team (and the gentleman) if it does go to court.
There are only two groups of people that know what’s going on here. One is the surrounding gentleman concerned and the other is Mercedes. I doubt that the two sides would agree. Everyone on here can go on about why would he leave, must have been treated badly, he’s bad at his job etc. but the fact remains people move around now. Increasingly people seem overlooked within the company they work for and companies seem to think that the way to gain new knowledge is to recruit from outside. All teams are guilty of this. Until this gets to court (if it ever does) all we say is pure speculation and as to whether Ferrari are/were involved and asked for this information is a complete guess.
Well would you believe it?
Ferrari have now denied all knowledge of the chap, and say he never had a contract and was never joining them.
Predictable or what, as the prospect of a McLaren sized fine looms.
That is not going to happen
No of course not they are Ferrari! Untouchable! 5% off the top! Veto in pocket!
However are there any accounts for the Swiss based FIA? Are they operational?