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Did China honeytrap a major US tech boss for AI secrets? | BBC News — Transcript

by BBC News · 2,480 words · 390 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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0:00It's like something out of a James Bond
0:02movie. One of the most powerful tech
0:03bosses in the world, pivotal in the
0:06global AI arms race, admitting he's had
0:09an affair with a suspected Chinese spy.
0:12>> An explosive new report is claiming
0:14China's top spy agency recruited a woman
0:17to target Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.
0:19>> Huang may be removed as CEO depending on
0:22the outcome of the investigations, which
0:24is a huge deal for a company that's as
0:26large as Apple.
0:27>> His computer chips help power everything
0:29from video games to chatbots like
0:32ChatGPT.
0:33>> You know, I think he's an honorable guy.
0:34I think he probably has
0:36an excuse.
0:37>> You know, he fell for it and he got
0:39played. It's a It's a tale as old as
0:41time.
0:41>> It's a shock and we know that these
0:43shocks tend to reverberate around the
0:45market.
0:45>> And if this causes the stock market
0:48bubble or the boom, depending what your
0:50perspective is, to burst, the
0:51implications will be really potentially
0:53very significant.
0:57>> In a moment, we'll find out about the
0:59alleged Chinese spy at the center of
1:01this and what information she could have
1:02passed to Beijing, whether the US
1:04President knew and when, and what it
1:07could mean for the race for AI
1:08dominance. But first, this is what we
1:11know so far.
1:12>> US tech giant Nvidia has opened an
1:14independent investigation following
1:16reports his boss Jensen Huang had a
1:18relationship with a businesswoman Alice
1:20Huang. US intelligence officials believe
1:22the Chinese businesswoman was a spy for
1:24Beijing, according to the New York
1:26Times. Worth $4.5 trillion, Nvidia is
1:30one of the world's most valuable
1:31companies and a key player in AI
1:33infrastructure.
1:34Huang has been in charge for more than
1:3630 years. Unlike many tech CEOs, Huang
1:39is a hugely popular figure. Taiwanese
1:41media coined the term jensanity to
1:43describe the level of adoration he
1:45generates when visiting Taiwan, where he
1:47was born. Jensen Huang admitted to
1:49having been unfaithful to his wife and
1:52apologized for hurting her and their
1:53children in a statement shared with
1:55Nvidia staff. He also apologized to
1:58Nvidia's employees, board of
1:59shareholders, as saying he had fallen
2:01short of his responsibilities. Nvidia
2:04said its board had no reason to believe
2:06the company's secrets or national
2:08security were compromised, adding that
2:10Huang was committed to continuing to
2:12lead the company. Huang said he will
2:14cooperate fully with the investigation.
2:17Well, our senior technology reporter
2:18Shauna McCallum is with me. Shauna,
2:20let's talk about Jensen Huang. How big
2:22of a deal is the company he runs,
2:24Nvidia?
2:25>> Well, Nvidia has been run by Jensen
2:28Huang, one of the co-founders for the
2:30last 30 years, and he's been at the helm
2:33ever since. You know, he's a big deal in
2:36the tech world. He's known for wearing
2:38his leather jacket, getting selfies with
2:42you know, adoring fans because the
2:44company is massive. It's one of the
2:45world's most valuable companies, valued
2:47at $4.5 trillion.
2:50The chips that they're making used to be
2:53for video games, but now is propping up
2:55much of the AI, doing all that number
2:57crunching behind the scenes, that AI
2:59that we use every day from ChatGPT to
3:02Claude made by Anthropic. So that's what
3:05the company is doing. That's what it's
3:06valued at. And Jensen himself has become
3:09also
3:10you know, in with all of the world
3:12leaders. He's known as being a kind of
3:14tech voice, certainly an aid to
3:17President Trump.
3:18>> So who is the suspected Chinese spy
3:20Alice Huang, and when did she come into
3:22the picture? Here's Tessa Wong.
3:25>> The US chip company says it's
3:26investigating reports that its CEO
3:28Jensen Huang has had a close
3:29relationship with a woman named Alice
3:31Huang, an executive at a Singaporean
3:33company called Mega Speed. Huang is a
3:36common Chinese surname. Here she is in
3:38May 2025, captured alongside Jensen
3:41Huang at a dinner that he hosted in
3:42Taipei. According to the New York Times,
3:45US officials believe that Alice Huang
3:46has been working for China's spy agency,
3:49collecting information about Jensen
3:51Huang and American AI chips, and
3:54possibly even trying to influence
3:55Nvidia. Now we don't know much about
3:57Alice Huang, but we do know that she
3:58also goes by her Chinese name Huang Le,
4:01and we also know that she has linked to
4:03MegaSpeed since 2023. MegaSpeed is a big
4:06customer of Nvidia. It buys their chips
4:08and it runs data centers across
4:10Southeast Asia. But MegaSpeed's also
4:12been accused of granting Chinese
4:14companies backdoor access to Nvidia's
4:16chips, which they can't get due to US
4:18restrictions. Now I have checked local
4:20business records and I found that a
4:22Chinese national named Huang Le was
4:24MegaSpeed's managing director from March
4:26to November 2023. A Singaporean man then
4:30took over the reins. Earlier today, I
4:31tried to visit MegaSpeed's office in
4:33Singapore's central business district,
4:35but I was denied entry. We've contacted
4:37MegaSpeed for comment.
4:38>> Well, someone who knows a lot about
4:40Jensen Huang is Steven Witt. He's an
4:42investigative journalist and author of a
4:44biography on Jensen Huang. Here's his
4:46blunt assessment.
4:48>> Uh Jensen got played.
4:50Uh you know, he fell for it. Uh I think
4:52uh Ms. Alice Huang is a woman who was
4:54running a big data center operation in
4:56Malaysia and and most of the chips that
4:58were shipped there were either diverted
5:00directly into China or used kind of
5:02illicitly and accessed by Chinese
5:04entities. It should have been obvious
5:07that this woman had some red flags about
5:09her. She had no uh business background.
5:12She had no computer science background.
5:14Uh MegaSpeed just kind of came out of
5:16nowhere to start building these data
5:17centers. Um and so Jensen should have
5:19been much more concerned. But I think,
5:21you know, he fell for it and he got
5:24played. It's a it's a tale as old as
5:25time.
5:26>> Well, let's take a closer look at the
5:28investigation that Nvidia has launched.
5:30Here's our North America technology
5:32correspondent, Lily Jamali.
5:35>> This investigation will be headed by
5:37independent directors on Nvidia's board
5:40with the help of outside counsel. They
5:43have said in a statement on Sunday that
5:45they will be looking at all the facts,
5:47but they also expressed confidence in
5:50Mr. Huang and his leadership team. It
5:53appears that they want him to stay put.
5:55My sources tell me that there is so much
5:57money on the line and there is also no
6:00clear succession plan in place.
6:02>> Well, at a regular press briefing,
6:04China's foreign ministry spokesperson
6:06said Beijing would not comment further.
6:09We have already responded, he said, to
6:11this. The allegations about Chinese
6:13spies are entirely groundless,
6:15speculative, and intended to smear and
6:18malign China.
6:20There are questions about what the US
6:22president knew and his administration
6:24and when. The New York Times reported in
6:27late October that Trump had been briefed
6:29last year on intelligence alleging Alice
6:32Huang was spying on China's behalf.
6:35Yet it made this year Jensen Huang
6:37joined Donald Trump's delegation of
6:39high-level tech bosses to China after a
6:41reported last-minute invitation. This
6:44was the president's response when he was
6:45asked about the scandal.
6:48>> President, Nvidia is investigating
6:49Jensen Huang's relationship with a
6:51Chinese spy. Have you spoken to Jensen
6:53Huang today?
6:53>> I have not spoken to him about it. I
6:56just know he's a fine person, but you
6:57never know what is going on.
7:00Um,
7:01I'm sure I hope everything's fine here.
7:03He's done such an incredible job and uh
7:06so I would certainly hope it. He's a
7:08fine person in my opinion.
7:09>> In hindsight, do you wish that you had
7:10acted on the intelligence when you were
7:12briefed about the spy line?
7:13>> I think you know, I think he's an
7:15honorable guy. I think he probably has
7:17an excuse for it, you know, and you have
7:20to hear it. No, you can't do that with
7:22people. He was uh
7:24He's done an amazing job for our
7:25country.
7:27>> The US Secretary of State Marco Rubio
7:29has refused to comment when asked about
7:31Huang, but he was certainly the most
7:33senior figure in the administration
7:35talking it up. Robert Jimison is the
7:37congressional correspondent for the New
7:38York Times. He says there are now
7:40serious questions for the entire Trump
7:42administration.
7:44>> We do know that the Secretary of State
7:45oversaw the drafting of the memo into
7:48Ms. Huang and and the uh the
7:50relationship between her and the Nvidia
7:53CEO and the funneling of information
7:55back to China. So you you know, you have
7:57to suspect that if the Secretary of
7:59State was involved, especially with such
8:01a close ally to Donald Trump, that the
8:03president was aware of what was going
8:05on. Um I think when it comes to the
8:07fallout, this could not have come at a
8:10more interesting or almost perilous
8:13political time for the president and for
8:15Republicans in particular because the
8:17firewall of support around Donald Trump,
8:19the Congress, both chambers of Congress
8:21that have been solidly Republican and
8:23backing him at every turn for the last
8:24two years, has just flipped in favor of
8:27Democrats. And so you've already seen
8:30top Democrats on the Banking Committee,
8:31which oversees the selling of chips, on
8:33the Foreign Relations Committee, which
8:35oversees international agreements
8:37between the United States and other
8:38countries, um, come out and say that
8:40they're going to aggressively
8:41investigate this and get to the bottom
8:42of what happened.
8:44>> Well, since 2022, the US has used
8:46various export controls to keep some of
8:49the most sophisticated advanced AI chips
8:52on the planet out of China's hands,
8:54which it says helps retain America's
8:56competitive edge and protects its
8:58national security.
8:59That means companies like Nvidia have
9:01been largely locked out of the lucrative
9:03Chinese market.
9:05Despite his apparent closeness to Trump,
9:07Huang has also not been able to get the
9:09administration's blessing to sell chips
9:12to China.
9:13Jensen Huang spoke to our economics
9:15editor Faisal Islam in September. Here
9:17he is on the battle for AI supremacy
9:20between the US and China.
9:23>> President Trump is very clear he wants
9:25America to win.
9:27And and um uh
9:30President Xi wants China to win.
9:33Um, and it's possible for for both of
9:35them too.
9:37Uh, and the reason for that is because
9:39it's not a zero-sum game.
9:41Uh, the advance of of human society is
9:43not a zero-sum game.
9:45And and so I I think that for America to
9:48win, the technology to to to win the AI
9:51race particularly, it's important that
9:53and President Trump sees this clearly,
9:55it's important that all AI companies,
9:58that all AI research is built on the
10:00American tech stack.
10:02And so if you would like if you would
10:04like America to be the global standard
10:06of technology, just as we are the global
10:09standard of the of currency, the US
10:11dollar,
10:12then you're going to need to make sure
10:13that that people can access this
10:15technology from all of the world,
10:16including China.
10:19>> Well, let's get Faisal's analysis, shall
10:21we, of that interview in light of the
10:23scandal we now know more about.
10:27>> It seems like quite openly from that
10:29that Jensen Huang had persuaded the
10:32president that it was a it wasn't about
10:35it was a bad idea to have blanket export
10:37bans and that you want to get, you know,
10:41you want to get the Chinese reliant on
10:43the US by selling it to them. Now, a
10:46very different approach was being taken
10:47elsewhere in the administration, others
10:49warning around the world that maybe you
10:51don't want to do this. There's all sorts
10:53of efforts by the Chinese to get hold of
10:54these chips through other methods and
10:56means. Um, so so this is the background
10:59context to it. But I think it's quite
11:01interesting to see that the central
11:03argument underpinning it, he was quite
11:05open about Jensen Huang, and uh
11:09and now that's all up for question.
11:11>> Well, indeed so. Shawn there, let's talk
11:13about President Trump's interest in this
11:15company. He took a stake in the company
11:17earlier this year.
11:19>> Yes, that's right. He has shares in the
11:21company. That was revealed in February.
11:23I believe it was um during the trip. It
11:26showed that he had purchased $1.5
11:29million worth. Now, the White House has
11:32said that has his administration takes
11:34care of those finances and it wasn't a
11:36direct choice by Trump. Um, but you
11:39know, they obviously also set um decide
11:42which chips they they sell to China. So
11:45that's an interesting point. I think the
11:46other point is, you know, what's the
11:48succession plan here? We're seeing this
11:51morning that the the boards are coming
11:53out and saying that they back uh Jensen
11:56Huang as the the leader of Nvidia. And
11:59we know his daughter Madison, his son
12:01Spencer, uh his son-in-law also work at
12:04the company. He's previously said that,
12:05you know, he would want the the new CEO
12:08to be someone with with from within the
12:10company. There are a few people, you
12:12know, shining stars within Nvidia, but
12:14no kind of obvious successor. It has got
12:17quite a strange hierarchy. And it's got
12:19quite a flat structure, so a different
12:21kind of company structure to to a lot of
12:23others. And so I think people will be
12:25watching to see, you know, how how it
12:27fares in the next few weeks after
12:30perhaps the dust has settled or or
12:32perhaps not on the scandal.
12:34>> And let's not forget this scandal comes
12:36at a turbulent time for the artificial
12:38intelligence industry and the markets.
12:40Last week an enormous sell-off wiped
12:42trillions of dollars off AI stock
12:43values, in part due to concerns the
12:46Democrat victory in the midterm
12:47elections would mean slower artificial
12:50intelligence development. Here's the
12:52Financial Times columnist Gillian Tett
12:54on what all of this means for the
12:55markets.
12:57>> This comes at a moment when the AI
12:59sector is facing a lot more political
13:02scrutiny, particularly from the
13:03Democrats post midterms. You've got a
13:06lot of populist outrage about what's
13:08going on with the so-called tech bros.
13:10And you have a sense that the stock
13:12markets are massively overheated in
13:15relation to AI. And if this causes the
13:19stock market bubble or the boom,
13:21depending what your perspective is, to
13:22burst, the implications both in terms of
13:24the wider stock markets and the economic
13:26outlook will be really potentially very
13:29significant. So this is much more than
13:31just one really badly timed, you know,
13:34very ill-conceived affair. It actually
13:37has a much bigger implication for the
13:39whole AI sector more widely.
13:42>> And that is all you need to know about
13:44Nvidia and Jensen Huang to this point.

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