Google has asked a judge to freeze Uber's self-driving-car project

Google has asked a federal judge to block Uber's self-driving-car project, alleging that the ride-hailing service is using stolen intellectual property to operate its self-driving vehicles, according to media reports.

The preliminary injunction, filed in federal court on Friday, comes a few weeks after Waymo filed an explosive lawsuit accusing Uber of stealing the design for its lidar sensor that allows the car to detect obstacles.

Waymo filed a sworn testimony by Gary Brown, a forensic security engineer, who claims Anthony Levandowski downloaded 14,000 highly confidential and proprietary design files relating to Waymo's self-driving-car project, The Verge reports.

Levandowski is one of the original members of Google's self-driving-car unit who left the company after nine years to co-found Otto, a self-driving-truck startup that was acquired by Uber last year.

Brown claims Levandowski downloaded the files December 2015 before he left the company in January 2016, according to the Verge.

This story is developing.