NEW YORK - Apple Inc. has settled a lawsuit against a website that had divulged company secrets, but the site, ThinkSecret.com, will shut down as part of the agreement.
The identity of the sources who leaked the information will not be revealed, according to the settlement announced Thursday at ThinkSecret.com.
The site's publisher, Harvard student Nick Ciarelli, said in a statement that he was "pleased to have reached this amicable settlement, and will now be able to move forward with my college studies and broader journalistic pursuits."
A California judge last year denied Apple's bid to force the identification of people who had apparently leaked company information to three other websites, ruling that they were entitled to the same protections as traditional journalists under a state law that prevents the forced disclosure of confidential news sources.
Apple spokesman Steve Dowling declined to provide other details of the settlement, saying the terms were confidential. He said the company was "happy to have this behind us."
The maker of iPods, iPhones and Macintosh computers sued ThinkSecret.com in January 2005 after the site published details about a new bare-bones Mac two weeks before the product was formally launched. Ciarelli started the site in 1998 when he was 13.
