A Honey Trap Targeting NVIDIA’s CEO? The Alleged Spy Was Just an Ordinary Auntie

Recently, I came across a rather surprising news story.

It suggested that Jensen Huang, the head of NVIDIA, a company leading the global AI chip market, may have fallen into a honey trap set by a Chinese female spy.

Huang has admitted to an affair and apologized. Whether the woman was actually a Chinese spy, however, remains under investigation.

According to reports, she was a Chinese business associate, and U.S. intelligence agencies suspect that she may have provided information to China.

If the head of a global AI company was targeted, this would be a major incident.

But the first thing that caught my attention was something rather more trivial.

Wait. Aren’t honey traps supposed to involve younger, glamorous women?

The Secretary Who Saved a Former Governor

This reminded me of a story once told by Hideo Higashikokubaru, the former governor of Miyazaki Prefecture in Japan, about what he believed may have been a honey trap.

He was drinking at a bar when an attractive woman approached him, and they began having an enjoyable conversation.

Then his secretary suddenly rushed over, looking pale.

“It is time to leave!”

The secretary then more or less dragged him away.

Higashikokubaru said that his secretary scolded him harshly afterward, and he later concluded, “That was definitely a honey trap.”

Whether it really was a trap is impossible to know, but it was excellent risk management by the secretary.

Higashikokubaru may only have thought he was enjoying a drink, but his secretary had probably already imagined the next morning’s tabloid headline.

Being a politician’s secretary must be a difficult job.

This Alleged Spy Did Not Match the Image in My Head

Back to the NVIDIA story.

When I saw the photograph of the woman shown in the reports, I felt slightly underwhelmed.

Rather than looking like a stunning beauty from a film, she struck me as an ordinary auntie—the kind of middle-aged woman you might see anywhere.

Forgive me for saying so, but she looked very different from the image of a honey trap in my head.

That led me to a silly question.

Did Huang prefer older women?

Or perhaps, for the head of a global company, an intelligent woman who understands business is more attractive than a young beauty.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that youth and beauty alone would not qualify anyone to work as a spy.

You would need to understand the target’s work, converse naturally, build trust, and draw out useful information.

If so, there is nothing surprising about an experienced woman succeeding in that role.

Perhaps espionage is another profession in which experience can matter more than youth.

Being Too Beautiful Might Look Suspicious

Thinking about it further, the idea may actually be quite rational.

What would happen if a young, beautiful woman suddenly appeared before the head of a major corporation and began acting unusually friendly?

He might be delighted, but his assistants and security staff would become suspicious.

“Who is that woman?”

“Where did you meet her?”

“Why is she approaching the CEO?”

If someone like Higashikokubaru’s secretary was nearby, the executive would be dragged away immediately.

But what if she was an ordinary-looking auntie you had met as an executive at a business partner?

She could discuss work. She could understand the industry. Even repeated dinners together could look like a normal business relationship.

As a way of lowering the target’s guard, that would be far more natural.

We do not know whether the woman in this case actually used any such method. But if the objective is collecting information, there is no need to send in a glamorous woman from a movie.

Being inconspicuous may itself be an advantage.

Apparently, Honey Traps Have No Age Limit

Come to think of it, our image of a honey trap may be far too influenced by films and television dramas.

A beautiful woman approaches, seduces someone, and before he realizes what has happened, state secrets have been stolen.

It is easy to understand.

In real intelligence gathering, however, earning the target’s trust may be more important.

After all, simply learning what the head of a global corporation is thinking and what business strategy he is planning could have enormous value for a rival country.

There may be situations in which hearing an executive’s honest thoughts is useful even without stealing a single blueprint.

In any case, this news slightly changed my image of honey traps.

I had assumed they caught men who became foolish around young, beautiful women, but apparently the reality is not so simple.

Do I now need to be wary of capable, ordinary aunties too?

Then again, if such a woman approached me, the most she could extract would be complaints about the IT industry.

She would not obtain any state secrets or even recover the cost of the drinks. It would be a waste of the spy’s salary.