That sure is a large sum to be fined, especially as it hasn't been proven that McLaren have actually used any of the data on their cars. The fine was because the documents were in McLarens chief designers possession. Here in Britain it's really big news as McLaren are British based with Lewis Hamilton a Brit, leading the world championship of F1 in his rookie year (beating his twice world champion team mate Alonso in the process) it seems that Nigel Stepney who was Ferraris chief mechanic is friendly with Mike Coughlan, chief designer of McLaren. Both were looking to move to another team & had approached the likes of Honda & Toyota for jobs. Stepney was p****d that he didn't get promotion when Ross Brawn (tech leader at Ferrari) retired. He's allegedly sabotaged the 2 Ferraris in previous races, one being at Monaco. the law suit against Stepney is still continuing.
Stepney handed a 788 page dossier on Ferrari to Coughlan which covered such aspects as the design of the 07 Ferrari, team personnel info, pit stop strategies & basically a run down on the whole Ferrari set up. Stupidly, Coughlan took the dossier to be photo copied & it was an employee at the printers that alerted Ferrari that the information was in Mclaren hands. A law suit was raised but due to insufficient evidence the FIA (Motorsport ruling body) ruled that no penalty would be given to McLaren. McLaren denied all knowledge that info in the dossier had been used on their cars & that only Coughlan knew of the dossiers existence.
However, & here's the twist, Fernando Alonso, McLarens 2 times world champion was getting pretty p****d that his rookie team mate was winning/gaining more points than he was (Hamilton is also leading the world championship) & in a blazing row with McLarens team principle Ron Dennis demanded number 1 driver status. McLaren have always raced with driver equality, & as such Ron Dennis refused Alonso number 1 status. He then told Dennis that he was in possession of emails from Mike Coughlan that could prove that other McLaren personnel knew about the Ferrari dossier. Alonso argued that unless he was given number 1 driver status he would hand over all of his damning information to the FIA. Ron Dennis would not be blackmailed & called Alonso's bluff. Ron Dennis himself reported to the FIA that he had become aware of the fact that other McLaren employees also knew of the dossier. So effectively it was Ron Dennis, McLaren MD that brought it to the FIA's attention in a bid to save the companys integrity. Mc Laren have a 3 year contract with Alonso as a driver but it's generally considered he'll be out of a job by the end of the year as McLaren are likely to release him from his contract. To say he's not well liked in the team would probably be an understatement
It's still not known though if any Ferrari technology has been used on the 07 McLaren car & hasn't/cant be proven, so it's a hefty fine when you consider that everybody in F1 Knows what the other teams are doing anyway, just like they always have.
The latest twist is that it now also seems that Renault F1 team will also be implicated in this scandal in some way regarding industrial espionage.
here's a link to a full run down for those interested in the whole saga
http://www.planet-f1.com/story/0,189...466749,00.html 
Brian Hobaugh SCCA National Tour June 2014
First Hemi 'Cuda Convertible Ever Built
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