Employee created a spreadsheet on personal MacBook to simplify workflow, but after quitting, ex-company now claims he stole it and filed a police report

Many employees have side projects or personal systems that help them work more efficiently. But what happens when a tool you created for yourself becomes something your employer later claims belongs to the company? That question is at the center of a viral Reddit post after a former operations analyst put implausible allegation that his ex-employer filed a police report accusing him of stealing ‘trade secrets.’

The catch, according to the employee, is that the so-called “secret” is a spreadsheet model he says he designed “from scratch” on his own laptop and in his own time.

Posting on Reddit’s r/legal forum, the California-based user explained that he spent three years working for a logistics startup. About 18 months into the job, he became frustrated with the company’s internal vendor tracking system, describing it as “genuinely terrible.”

So, rather than wait for a fix, he built his own solution. “On my own time, on my personal MacBook, I built a spreadsheet model that pulled together delivery times, error rates, and cost variance in a way that actually made sense,” he wrote. “I used it at work because it made my job easier. Nobody asked me to build it, nobody paid me extra to build it, I just did it.”

The employee said he resigned from the company two months ago and took the spreadsheet file with him because he believed it was his personal creation. He claimed the document was stored on his own hardware and contained “no proprietary data, just formulas and structure I designed myself.” Then came an unexpected phone call.

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“Last Thursday a detective called me,” the Redditor wrote. “My former company filed a report claiming I removed a ‘proprietary analytical system’ when I left. They are apparently calling my spreadsheet a trade secret.”

The situation became more complicated because, according to the post, he had once emailed the file from his work laptop to his personal email account while his MacBook was being repaired. He acknowledged that the transfer likely remains in the company’s server logs. “I was not trying to steal anything, I just needed access to my own work. But I can see how it looks,” he explained.

The user added that he answered a few of the detective’s initial questions before realizing he might need legal advice. At the heart of the debate is a common workplace gray area: Who owns a tool or system developed by an employee if it was created independently but later used for work?

The Redditor insists the spreadsheet was built outside office hours, on his own device, and without instructions or additional compensation from the company. He also says he can prove the file existed on his personal laptop “months before I ever used the work one.”

From the employer’s perspective, however, the fact that the spreadsheet was used in the company’s operations, and that a version was at one point accessed through company equipment, could be central to its claim that the file formed part of a “proprietary analytical system.”

The post quickly drew attention from readers, many of whom urged the former employee to stop speaking with investigators and seek legal counsel immediately. Others pointed out that intellectual property disputes can become complicated when personal creations are integrated into workplace processes, especially in states like California where employment and invention-assignment rules can involve multiple factors.

For now, the former analyst says he has not been charged with any crime. According to his account, the detective described the call as part of “gathering information.”

His post ended with two questions that resonated with thousands of readers: “Do I need a lawyer before this goes any further? And does it matter that I can prove the file existed on my personal laptop months before I ever used the work one?”

For now, those questions remain unanswered, leaving a broader issue hanging over the discussion: when personal innovation becomes part of the workplace, where exactly is the line between individual ownership and a company’s claim to a trade secret?