OpenAI employee arrested for allegedly using AI and toilet paper to record secret meetings - FBI Director Kash Patel took the opportunity to say AI companies are "essential" to national security.

Artificial intelligence and toilet paper: The joke writes itself, doesn't it?

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An OpenAI engineer has been arrested and charged with using (or attempting to use) a recording device to spy on the company's confidential communications. That's according to the US Department of Justice, and while commercial espionage is nothing new, there's an ironic twist: The accused employee appears to have done it with the help of artificial intelligence. Oh, and some toilet paper

According to FBI Director Kashish Patel's complaint summary, Abdul Rahman Alfozan, a Saudi national, "concealed the appearance of a secret recording device in his employer's executive conference room to covertly record sensitive communications about the company's ultra-high-tech information technology."

In case you haven't heard, that's what the bigwigs in the US are now calling artificial intelligence: super-intelligence. Courtesy of President Trump, of course, who said last month that the administration would use the term instead of artificial intelligence "in any applicable circumstances."

The FBI director also said: "Protecting America's SI innovation is essential to protecting our nation's economic strength and national security, and the FBI considers this mission one of our highest counterintelligence priorities."

Alfozan had been working for OpenAI as an engineer since July 2025, and at the end of last month OpenAI discovered a USB audio recording device connected to a conference room television, the complaint said. According to the Department of Justice, the device, which was installed a few days before the discovery, was "hidden in toilet paper."

The complaint also alleges that Alfozan's wife's "chatbot" account (without specifying whether it was a ChatGPT account or something else) sent requests related to such things as "build[ing] a continuous audio recorder", "enhance[ing] sound and live listening" and "encrypt[ing] the SD card". Apparently there were also messages regarding a specific recording device that had been found.

The conference room in question seems to have been an important room. The Ministry of Justice explains:

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"According to the complaint, the meetings in the executive conference room where Recorder 1 was discovered often involved highly confidential technical, business, and strategic discussions. Information, including proprietary research, product plans, and business development opportunities, as well as non-public information about Open AI's technical progress and strategic decisions, capabilities, priorities, government commitments, and business relationships."

It seems that the various annexes of the government take this issue very seriously. Not surprising, of course, given the development of artificial intelligence—no, I'm not calling it "SI"—considered important to national security and well-being.

"This serious situation demonstrates why winning the global hyperintelligence race is a national security bonus... The intelligence community remains committed to protecting America's advanced intellectual property from foreign threats," said Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton.

It seems that Craig H. Misakian, the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California, agrees: "For us, this is a matter of national security. "This arrest demonstrates our continued efforts to work with the FBI to identify and prosecute those who seek to steal our technology as alleged in the complaint."

But my question is: If the claims are true, could Alfuzan have done this without using an AI chatbot? Snake and tail and so on.

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