Google engineer accused of turning Year in Search secrets into Polymarket payday

Summary

Legal Google engineer accused of turning Year in Search secrets into Polymarket payday Feds say insider used confidential search trend data to score $1.2M in prediction market profits A long-serving Google engineer based in Zurich faces charges in the US for allegedly profiting from confidential company information by making Polymarket bets.According to court documents, between October and December 2025, Italian national Michele Spagnuolo, 36, made a series of bets using confidential data related to Google's annual Year in Search report. What started out with a few hundred dollars placed on Kendrick Lamar being named the most-searched individual in 2025 turned into $2.75 million worth of bets related to whether specific individuals would or would not be named the most-searched in Google's Year in Search. The criminal complaint filed regarding Spagnuolo's alleged offenses related to the following bets: $403 for Kendrick Lamar to be most-searched at 3 percent probability $10,807 on Pope Leo XIV not being the most-searched person $381.12 for D4vd to be among the top five most-searched individuals, with implied odds reflecting an 18 percent probability. This bet was made after allegedly re-accessing Year in Search data in November, which had changed since the last time he allegedly accessed it in October$5 for D4vd to be most-searched at a probability of only slightly higher than 0 percent$937,688 for Bianca Censori to not be the most-searched at 85 percent probability$509,149 for Donald Trump to not be the most-searched at 90 percent probability$171,612 for Donald Trump not to be among the top five most-searched at 66 percent probabilityAfter Google released its Year in Search for 2025 on December 4, Spagnuolo allegedly made approximately $1.2 million in profits from the bets made by the AlphaRaccoon account on Polymarket.Investigating the matter, Brandon Racz, special agent at the FBI who sought Spagnuolo's arrest warrant, stated that the AlphaRaccoon account, which w...