A private spreadsheet naming “over a hundred” alleged sexual predators in Silicon Valley includes “prominent investors and businessmen,” sources tell The Post.
One up-and-coming tech worker, who asked not to be identified, described how she was shocked when she saw the names on the list which she added her own account of sexual misconduct to.
“Some of them were very prominent names, you know? People who were famous investors. Businessmen who were in the scene, I had seen them at parties before.”
The closely guarded list of tech predators serves as a way of warning others, multiple Silicon Valley insiders who have seen the list said. They noted it contains allegations of drugging, sex assaults and rapes and includes names of people at the biggest tech and Artificial Intelligence companies.
However, verifying the authenticity of the accounts is another question.
The source who had added to the document, who is in her 20s, says she was approached and invited to add her harrowing ordeal after she had mentioned it to others.
“I met some women who ran the ‘whisper network,’ it has hundreds of cases,” she told The Post. “I only found out about it because I started asking around.”
Sources said many women in Silicon Valley feel unable to approach police when bad things happen to them at the hands of the tech elite and they fear retaliation from the powerful people they accuse, knowing speaking up could end their budding careers.
“I was worried that if I tried for justice in my case and I lost, I would be blacklisted from every investor in town,” she said.
Worrying incidents described to The Post by four sources took place in so called “hacker houses,” where people who share a kitchen or party invitations may also be sharing investments, working together or making introductions to a future employer. Those overlapping relationships can become awkward when the lines are blurred.
A second insider speaking on background described to The Post a predatory approach from some males in which friendship is used to get close to someone, learn their vulnerabilities and then push past boundaries.
The insider claimed some tech predators seek people to manipulate — preying on the isolated or vulnerable. Often these are younger girls or those who have recently arrived in the country or Silicon Valley hoping to make a name for themselves.
The insider also said the opposite is also true — some target successful, independent people whom an abuser would regard as a “trophy.”
“Some predators want the shiniest star, the harder you are to take down, the more powerful they feel. It’s a conquest,” they said.
The insider noted a culture which celebrates founders, who made their careers refusing to accept rejection in business, can become dangerous when the same is applied to social situations.
Neither the people causing harm nor those being harmed are necessarily one gender, the insider emphasized.
Yehong Zhu, who has lived in several hacker houses, said she was also a victim of rape. In her case, the person she accused was someone she had considered a friend.
She filed a December 2021 police report accusing the person, a former member of San Francisco “hacker house” Genesis, of rape and assault.
Zhu, founder of the app Zette, says the man fled, and has not been located or arrested, despite other people in their friendship circle keeping in contact with him.
“I kept saying no [to him],” she told The Post.
After the alleged rape, she says, a female friend worried aloud about the damage her accusation would do to his reputation. A house organizer discouraged her from going to the police, then proposed a committee and a vote when Zhu wanted him removed.
She went to police and retained lawyers. She contacted people who knew the alleged attacker, hoping someone could help locate him, but many did not answer.
“We invested together. We did business together,” she said of those who refused to help her.
Michael Burshteyn, a lawyer for Genesis founder Jeremy Nixon, told The Post that his client was unaware of the specific situation described to him.
“But he would support and encourage law enforcement and just complying with the law in any situation like that and prioritize safety,” Burshteyn said.
A separate, written account from Muse, another San Francisco “community house,” described a date rape.
Its anonymous author — who was identified to The Post but declined to comment, saying she is seeking legal counsel — claims she was living at the house on a trial basis when a man vouched for by the community offered her ketamine in January 2025. The alleged victim claims she said while sober that she did not want sex, but the man had sex while she was heavily impaired after repeated doses of ketamine.
When she then told one of the people running the house, she writes, he minimized what happened and encouraged a mediated conversation, which would allow the alleged attacker to return.
The victim didn’t agree and says she was told to leave the house by the end of March, the alleged attacker was even allowed to attend a house celebration before her departure.
Some residents later supported the woman, including another female in the house who helped bring her full account to others in the house, the document says. But the anonymous writer says the community declined to issue a public statement acknowledging failures, which she requested. The Muse house did not respond to a request for comment.
Meanwhile, a former resident of Launch House, a Beverly Hills-based founder community in Southern California, described a markedly different response when she and other women sought help.
The woman, who asked to remain anonymous, said she suspected she had been drugged during a gathering. She could not remember parts of the night and learned afterward that a friend had helped her into bed.
“I had the chills and I was sweating at the same time, almost like I had the flu. And I was outside on the patio in the sun, I could not move,” she told The Post.
Other women told her the same man had touched them inappropriately or made unwanted advances, she said. Those who had been affected went to the house’s founders together.
“They got rid of him immediately, he was kicked out of the house,” the woman said.
Co-founder Brett Goldstein and another founder spoke with the women, changed the locks and offered to help them contact police. However, she decided against doing so because she could not remember what happened or establish it through witnesses.
“I did stay on and felt safe in the house,” she added.
However, the assailant subsequently targeted her and the company online, including through private messages, she claimed.
“I worry that if I find any type of success that is in public, he’s going to come back and make me feel even worse,” she added.
Goldstein told The Post Launch House is no longer operating in the same form and added: “We developed Launch House’s conduct policies and incident-response procedures with input from a relevant HR executive, a DEI & Safety consulting firm … anyone running an in-person experience has a responsibility to continuously improve the safety of their operation.”
None of these allegations are new, and warnings about entwined group living environments have circulated for years. In 2022, AI researcher Keerthana Gopalakrishnan wrote about sexual pressure in Effective Altruism circles.
She challenged reliance on community mediation for sexual-assault complaints, while calling for greater clarity in distinguishing between coercion and consensual polyamory.
Zhu says she went public with her story in the hopes of helping other women come forward and avoid the same fate. She says she founded Zette to make quality journalism easier to access while helping publishers earn money. She wants to be known for what she builds, too.
“I don’t want this issue to be the only thing attached to my name,” she said. “I have so many dreams to build.”
