(Yicai) Dec. 4 -- A research paper on artificial intelligence co-authored by Tian Keyu, the former ByteDance intern being sued by the Chinese tech giant for USD1.1 million after allegedly tampering with AI model training, has won a prestigious award.

The paper, titled Visual Autoregressive Modeling: Scalable Image Generation via Next-Scale Prediction, was recognized by the Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems. Published by ByteDance’s commercial products and technology department in collaboration with Peking University, it explores a scalable method for image generation. Tian was cited as the first of its five authors.

The NeurIPS is an important annual global conference on machine learning and computational neuroscience. It rewarded OpenAI's paper DALL·E: Creating Images From Text in 2020, which marked a breakthrough in text-to-image generation. This year’s event will start in Vancouver, Canada, on Dec. 10.

ByteDance has filed a lawsuit in a Beijing court against Tian, seeking damages of CNY8 million (USD1.1 million), CNY20,000 (USD2,760) in reasonable expenses, and a public apology, China News Service reported on Nov. 27.

Between June and July, Tian, who worked in ByeDance’s commercial products and technology department, allegedly tampered with code to disrupt AI model training tasks during his internship, reportedly motivated by frustration over resource allocation, the Beijing-based TikTok owner wrote in a report on Nov. 5.

ByteDance terminated Tian's contract and reported him to the Sunshine Integrity Alliance and Enterprise Anti-Fraud Alliance. The alliance, whose members include Alibaba Group Holding and Midea Group, is a platform for tackling corporate fraud and enhancing compliance.

ByteDance even reported Tian, a master's student at Peking University, to his university, a company insider told Yicai. He denied the accusation many times, blaming another intern for interfering with the code, and even reported the alleged defamation to the police. ByteDance was alarmed by Tian's lack of understanding of the incident's gravity and subsequently sued him for violating the company's security rules, the person added.

The conflict between ByteDance and its ex-intern stems from a dispute over resource allocation and technological direction, according to the head of a leading AI institution in China. ByteDance has not confirmed the exact cause of the dispute.

Editor: Emmi Laine