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A day after Lukasz Krupski put out a hearth at a Tesla automobile supply location in Norway, critically burning his fingers and stopping a catastrophe, he received an electronic mail from Elon Musk.
“Congratulations for saving the day!” Mr. Musk, Tesla’s chief govt, wrote in March 2019.
However what began as a narrative a few heroic worker and a grateful employer has devolved into an epic battle between the carmaker and Mr. Krupski, a service technician. The struggle has spawned lawsuits in Norway and the USA and caught the eye of regulators in a number of nations.
After initially being hailed as a savior, Mr. Krupski mentioned in an interview with The New York Occasions, he was harassed, threatened and ultimately fired after complaining about what he thought of grave security issues at his office close to Oslo. Mr. Krupski, initially from Poland, was a part of a crew that helped put together Teslas for patrons however turned so annoyed with the corporate that final 12 months he handed over reams of knowledge from the carmaker’s laptop system to Handelsblatt, a German enterprise newspaper.
The information contained lists of Tesla workers, together with Mr. Musk, usually with their Social Safety numbers and different private data. There have been 1000’s of accident reviews and different inside Tesla communications that Handelsblatt used as the premise for tales about flaws with the corporate’s Autopilot driver-assistance software program.
The information additionally offered the premise for tales by Handelsblatt and Wired journal about how a lot hassle Tesla was having manufacturing the Cybertruck pickup, which the corporate has mentioned shall be delivered to clients on the finish of this month, virtually three years delayed. (Among the data got here from a second, unidentified Tesla worker.)
Mr. Krupski mentioned he had gotten entry to delicate information just by getting into search phrases in an inside firm web site, elevating questions on how Tesla protected the privateness of 1000’s of workers and its personal secrets and techniques.
The Information Safety Authority within the Netherlands, the place Tesla has its European headquarters, is investigating whether or not the breach violated privateness legal guidelines. A spokeswoman for the authority confirmed that it was investigating however declined to remark additional.
Tesla and three legal professionals representing the corporate didn’t reply to requests for remark.
In the USA, Benson Pai, a former Tesla manufacturing employee, has sued the automaker in federal court docket in California, claiming that lax safety by Tesla uncovered worker data that could possibly be offered to criminals. Legal professionals for Mr. Pai are in search of approval from a decide to pursue the case as a category motion on behalf of tens of 1000’s of Tesla workers.
Mr. Krupski shared the information with Aaron Greenspan, a distinguished Tesla critic and short-seller, who urged him to offer data he had collected about Autopilot to the U.S. Nationwide Freeway Site visitors Security Administration. The security company has had a long-running investigation into the software program, which may steer, speed up and cease a automobile by itself however requires a driver to be able to take management at any second. The company has interviewed Mr. Krupski a number of instances, he mentioned, a sign that his data was taken critically.
Mr. Greenspan mentioned he had begun closing out his brief positions in Tesla shortly after listening to from Mr. Krupski.
The U.S. security company has confirmed that it’s investigating whether or not Autopilot performed a task in a whole lot of accidents, some deadly, however declined to touch upon any interactions with Mr. Krupski. Tesla has maintained that Autopilot makes vehicles safer and not too long ago prevailed in opposition to a lawsuit that had claimed the software program was accountable for a deadly crash in California.
Mr. Krupski and Mr. Greenspan additionally wrote a letter to the Securities and Trade Fee elevating questions on Tesla’s accounting practices, based mostly partially on the information Mr. Krupski had collected. He mentioned he didn’t know what the fee had executed with the data.
The S.E.C. didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Mr. Krupski remained nameless till he spoke on the file to Handelsblatt final week.
Within the interview with The Occasions, Mr. Krupski, 38, mentioned he was unemployed and had exhausted his financial savings. He has served Tesla with formal discover that he intends to sue for compensation, however can’t pursue the case additional till he scrapes collectively sufficient cash to pay a lawyer. In contrast to legal professionals in the USA, legal professionals in Norway usually are not allowed to work on fee, amassing a share of any award in the event that they win however nothing in the event that they lose.
Tormod Tingstad, an Oslo lawyer, is representing Mr. Krupski freed from cost whereas they attempt to elevate cash.
None of this might have been foreseen on March 30, 2019, when Mr. Krupski, who had been employed just a few months earlier, was a part of a crew summoned on brief discover to organize Teslas for supply to clients in Norway, the place electrical autos account for greater than 80 % of recent automobile gross sales.
Tesla, which sells vehicles on to patrons, was utilizing house in an exhibition corridor close to Oslo to ship autos. 1000’s of individuals had been visiting a motor present in the identical complicated.
Round midday, a charging gadget that one other worker had improperly modified burst into flames beneath a Mannequin 3 sedan. Mr. Krupski yanked the gadget away and, together with his naked fingers, pulled out wiring, pipes and different elements that had been burning and melting. He used rags and towels to suffocate the flames.
“It’s truthful to say that if it wasn’t for his motion, the outcome would have been a automobile on fireplace,” Mr. Krupski’s supervisor wrote in an electronic mail to Mr. Musk the subsequent day. Mr. Krupski mentioned the hearth might have unfold, endangering employees and clients ready close by and forcing evacuation of the motor present.
The one individual critically injured was Mr. Krupski, who was hospitalized with extreme burns however has recovered.
After Mr. Musk congratulated Mr. Krupski, the technician replied with complaints about security practices at Tesla’s Norwegian operation. On the day of the hearth, he wrote, there have been no fireplace extinguishers, cardboard bins and different flammable materials had been strewn about, and workers weren’t briefed about the place they might be working.
“OK, please let me know if there’s something we should always nonetheless do,” Mr. Musk replied, in keeping with a replica of the e-mail included in authorized paperwork ready by Mr. Tingstad.
However Mr. Krupski’s direct communications with the Tesla chief govt didn’t sit properly together with his bosses in Norway. In keeping with Mr. Krupski, his supervisor started questioning his efficiency and telling him he had no future at Tesla.
“Lengthy story brief I’m being fired,” Mr. Krupski wrote to Mr. Musk in late April 2019, lower than 4 weeks after the hearth. Mr. Musk replied, “I can’t learn emails until important to Tesla.” That was the tip of their correspondence.
Within the months that adopted, Mr. Krupski mentioned, he was threatened and harassed by co-workers and exiled to a basement. One co-worker threatened to stab him within the again with a screwdriver, he mentioned. Mr. Krupski and different employees had been furloughed throughout the pandemic, and he missed work due to stress-related well being issues. Then, in 2022, he was fired after being accused of dangerous conduct and poor time administration, and of being a unfavourable affect.
His bosses additionally mentioned Mr. Krupski had taken footage at a Tesla facility in violation of firm coverage. He mentioned he had taken photographs to doc questions of safety, which included use of a rolling desk that workers put underneath a automobile when eradicating a battery. The desk was designed to bear a most of 500 kilograms (about 1,100 kilos), Mr. Krupski mentioned, whereas the batteries weighed considerably extra. If a desk collapsed, he mentioned, employees could possibly be critically injured or killed.
In a letter to Mr. Krupski’s lawyer, a Norwegian regulation agency representing Tesla mentioned the corporate would dispute that he had been topic to retaliation. The letter accused Mr. Krupski of misappropriating firm data and threatened to hunt damages from him.
Tesla has obtained an injunction from a Norwegian court docket ordering Mr. Krupski to not distribute any extra firm data. The court docket additionally seized his laptop computer and turned it over to Tesla. The corporate notified workers of the information breach on Aug. 18, about three months after it discovered that Handelsblatt had the data.
Data together with work electronic mail addresses, compensation and Social Safety numbers might need been leaked, Tesla instructed workers in an electronic mail, however mentioned, “We’ve no proof that any private data was misused or shall be utilized in a way that might hurt you.”
Mr. Krupski mentioned that he had suffered from despair, anxiousness and sleeplessness because of his battle with Tesla, however that he felt relieved to not be nameless.
“I really feel like simply by going public I’ve a brand new rush of power,” he mentioned. “I’ve motivation that, OK, I can perhaps begin constructing my life once more.”
Noam Scheiber contributed reporting.
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