A lot of the legal action is a warning to current employees who may have been considering doing the same.

Apple is large. People free stronger allegiance to their cultural and ethnic groups than their companies. They just don’t want to get in trouble.

That secretive culture died over a decade ago. Everything gets leaked now.

Why do think they would want to be vindictive? The point is to prevent leaks, leaving lapses is exactly counter to that goal.

Apple leaks like a sieve. The extreme secrecy culture is a pointless drag on productivity, maintained long past its usefulness for the sole benefit of the execs practicing their Steve Jobs "one more thing" keynote cargo cult.