A former employee of Russian search engine Yandex allegedly tried to sell its source code on the black market

A former employee of Yandex, the Russian internet company that's the country's main rival to Google, allegedly stole the source code and algorithms for its search engine and tried to sell it on the black market to fund his own startup.

Russian newspaper Kommersant reports that a former Yandex employee, Dmitriy Korobov, downloaded a piece of software named Arcadia, and it included crucial information about how Yandex's search engine works.

Korobov reportedly planned to sell that information for $25,000 (£16,700) and 250,000 rubles (£2,330), but Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) arrested him before the transaction took place.

Ars Technica reports that the information Korobov allegedly stole probably wouldn't have been valuable to companies like Google.

Rapsi News reports that Korobov's hearing took place earlier this month, and he received a two-year suspended sentence after being accused of illegal possession and distribution of commercial secrets.