Former Google CEO accused of spying on employees through backdoor account

When Columbia University law and MBA student Michelle Ritter met former Google CEO Eric Schmidt in 2020, she said she wanted to potentially invest in a sports tech startup she was developing.

The dinner blossomed into a romance and business partnership in which she says the 70-year-old billionaire invested more than $100 million in a co-owned tech incubator — before it all fell apart.

Now, Ritter accuses Schmidt of stealing her business from under her, sexually assaulting her twice during their relationship, and tapping her Google background to hack into her email and online computer files, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

“During their relationship, Schmidt admitted that when he worked at Google, he and a group of Google engineers built an internal ‘backdoor’ into Google servers to spy on Google employees. Accordingly, the backdoor enabled him to access anyone’s Google account and personal information.”

Google is also named as a defendant in the lawsuit and is accused of “knowingly surrendering, failing to treat, and materially facilitating unauthorized access” to Rater’s accounts despite providing notice. Schmidt and Co. are accused of violating California’s Comprehensive Computer Data Access and Fraud Act, and a section of the state’s penal code that prohibits wiretapping.

Patricia Glazer, an attorney representing Schmidt, called the case “yet another desperate and destructive attempt to spread false and defamatory statements to escape accountability from an existing arbitrator in a trade dispute.”

Glazer added: “The claims made here are in direct contradiction to her own words … and are Hail Mary’s last hope to save her from the consequences of her actions. We are confident that we will prevail on both specific legal matters to enforce arbitration and to dismiss these false allegations.”

Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The complaint is the latest filing in a legal dispute that stretches back to at least December 2024, when Ritter sought a domestic violence restraining order against Schmidt. She later withdrew it after reaching a financial settlement with Schmidt, with whom she had started a New York high-tech incubator with offices in Los Angeles, according to court records.

In her new lawsuit, Ritter alleges that Schmidt did not honor the settlement because of false allegations that she was behind the media leak. She seeks resolution, which requires conflict mediation, to be eliminated.

Schmidt’s attorneys have called her lawsuit a “gross abuse of the judicial system” and “a transparent ploy to defame and defame” Schmidt, according to court records. He is seeking to settle the dispute through arbitration.

Most of the records in the case are under seal and many of the files have been heavily redacted. The suit seeks at least $100 million in damages, with the next hearing set for Dec. 4. She is represented by Los Angeles attorney Skip Miller Law Firm.

Schmidt served as Google’s CEO from 2001 to 2011 and later served as chairman of the Silicon Valley company and its parent Alphabet until 2017. He owns $14 billion worth of shares in the original Alphabet, giving him a net worth of nearly $34 billion, according to Forbes. He owns several homes in Greater Los Angeles.

In a petition for a December 2024 restraining order, Ritter alleged that she was living in an “absolute digital surveillance system” and that Schmidt had hacked her corporate website, controlled her digital business records and directed private investigators to track down her parents, the court filing said.

The request for a restraining order also asked the judge to order Schmidt not to assault her “sexually or otherwise.”

The lawsuit filed Wednesday details their business ventures and alleges a personal relationship that grew to the point that Schmidt promised to marry her and have children despite their 39-year age difference.

The lawsuit says their Steel Perlot project was a success, with Schmidt investing more than $100 million in accelerators and startups in AI, crypto and other industries — prompting Schmidt to take control of the company and its business from her.

Media reports suggest otherwise. Forbes wrote that the project ran out of money in 2003 and required millions from Schmidt to cover salaries and other expenses.

The lawsuit alleges that Schmidt abused her during the development of the relationship and that he “forced sexual intercourse” with her on a boat off the coast of Mexico in November 2021 and had sex with her without her consent during the Burning Man festival in Nevada in August 2023.

Schmidt, who has been married for more than 40 years, has been romantically linked to many younger women in the media.

The bitter feud with Reiter coincides with another business dispute he had with public relations executive Marcy Simon, with whom he had a two-decade relationship that ended in 2014. It also included a joint venture, according to a New York Times report. The report did not include allegations of sexual assault.

Schmidt has acquired a certain gravitas in Silicon Valley, serving as a technical adviser to the Obama administration and the military, testifying on Capitol Hill about artificial intelligence and giving more than $1 billion to charity.

He is also part owner of the Washington Commanders football team and has amassed a real estate portfolio estimated to be worth several hundred million dollars.

Schmidt reportedly spent $110 million this year on a 56,000-square-foot mansion in Holmby Hills built by late producer Aaron Spelling. In 2021, he acquired a 15,000-square-foot Bel Air property previously owned by the Hilton family, where court records show Ritter was living when she took out the restraining order.

Schmidt earlier this year took a controlling interest in Relativity Space, a Long Beach startup founded in 2015 to bring 3-D manufacturing to rocketry.

However, he later changed his focus and Schmidt indicated in a social media post that his interest may have to do with launching AI data centers in space due to their power requirements.