U.S. SEC, federal prosecutors charge former Netflix staffers with insider trading

The SEC's complaint, filed in federal court in Seattle, charges the streaming service's ex-staffers with violating antifraud provisions and trying to evade detection by using encrypted messaging applications

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said on Wednesday it has charged three former engineers at Netflix Inc with trading on non-public information around the company's subscriber growth that generated over $3 million in total profit. (Subscribe to our Today's Cache newsletter for a quick snapshot of top 5 tech stories. Click to subscribe for free.) The SEC's complaint, filed in federal court in Seattle, charges the streaming service's ex-staffers with violating anti-fraud provisions and trying to evade detection by using encrypted messaging applications. It also found that the staffers exchanged the information with relatives and friends so as to receive cash kickbacks in advance of several consecutive Netflix quarterly earnings, the SEC said.