Apple Hired Contractors to Extract Family from Kharkiv, Says Former Engineer

Kate Reznykova, a Ukrainian-born engineer formerly employed by Apple, said the company “hired security contractors” in 2023 to bring her grandmother to safety from Kharkiv to Poland.

Reznykova recalled the incident on social media to which she attached a screenshot of an email, reportedly from Apple CEO Tim Cook. She said in the comments that the operation was “very internal” and not released to the press.

“I’ve never told how much @Apple did to help evacuate my grandmother from the hell that was happening in Kharkiv in 2023. They hired security contractors to get people out. The level of coordination on the ground and online was insane – translators, drivers, everything. Grateful,” Reznykova said in a social media update on Friday.

She described it as a “full-blown operation” and said Apple covered a variety of expenses.

“It was like a full-blown operation. We had a few WhatsApp chats with different coordinators and drivers on the ground. Apple paid for the hotel and tickets to a safe place from Poland,” she said in the comments.

She praised the operation as “beyond anything an employer would have done” in another comment while maintaining that “It’s not affiliation or promotion of Apple in any way.”

Reznykova’s LinkedIn profile stated that she was employed by Apple between December 2020 and 2022, where she first worked as a senior automation engineer and later as an engineering manager. She currently works as a partner at Next47, a Silicon Valley-based venture capital (VC) firm.

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The extraction from Kharkiv seems to have taken place after Reznykova left Apple, according to available information.

Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, is located 34 kilometers (22 miles) from the Russian border and has witnessed frequent attacks by Russian missiles and glide bombs – often with little or no warning due to the short distances involved.

The city is also home to numerous tech companies, including local and foreign startups. Olga Shapoval, executive director of the Kharkiv IT Cluster, told Kyiv Post in May that the local tech community has adapted to the war and continued to thrive despite constant Russian attacks, where the city’s proximity to the front has also given birth to a range of local defense tech startups.