Chinese intelligence reportedly used an executive to target Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang

What's going on

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, the man behind the world's most valuable chipmaker, was reportedly the target of a Chinese spy operation. A New York Times report from November 6, 2026 says US intelligence agencies have concluded that China's main intelligence service, the Ministry of State Security (MSS), recruited an executive named Alice Huang. She works for Megaspeed, a Singapore-based data center company and Nvidia customer. Alice and Jensen Huang are not related.

The NYT had already reported a week earlier that Jensen Huang was seen as the target of a "Chinese espionage plot" and had a close relationship with Alice Huang. What's new is that US agencies now consider her recruitment by the MSS established. At the same time, three House committees have invited Jensen Huang to a closed-door briefing.

What Alice Huang was supposed to achieve

According to the NYT, Alice Huang was meant to gather information on American AI chips and "possibly influence the company to push for making its most advanced chips available to China." The paper describes her relationship with Jensen Huang as "close." She also reportedly has ties to executives "at the highest levels of the AI chip industry," including the leadership of Taiwanese hardware maker Gigabyte.

Data Center Dynamics reports that authorities in the US, Singapore and Taiwan are investigating Alice Huang. According to BigGo Finance, the Wall Street Journal reported that officials in at least three countries feared she was passing information to the Chinese government, possibly including sensitive details about Nvidia chips.

How intelligence agencies came across Jensen Huang

Data Center Dynamics describes how the contact came to light: while monitoring Alice Huang, US agencies noticed she was communicating with a US citizen. Intelligence services can't surveil Americans without a court order. They can, however, request so-called "unmasking," which reveals the identity of a US citizen in intercepted communications when that person is in contact with someone under surveillance. That's how they learned the person on the other end was Jensen Huang.

When President Donald Trump was briefed about a year ago, US officials didn't believe the Nvidia CEO knew about the alleged intelligence gathering. Trump, who is on friendly terms with Jensen Huang, did nothing, and neither Nvidia nor Huang himself was warned. Nvidia said:

"We are confident that the US government would inform us if it considered someone a threat to American industry."

Asked by reporters whether he still trusts Jensen Huang, Trump said: "I'd like to say yes. Unless we find out something to the contrary." He said he had "always found him to be very proper," but called it "a very complex subject."

Congress calls him in

In a letter dated November 4, 2026, the chairs of three House committees asked Jensen Huang to appear at a joint closed-door briefing. The signatories are Republicans Brian Mast (Foreign Affairs Committee), John Moolenaar (Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party) and Rick Crawford (Intelligence Committee). According to IBTimes Singapore, the letterhead also lists Democrat Gregory Meeks, ranking member of the Foreign Affairs Committee.

The lawmakers describe Alice Huang as a "publicly known intelligence asset of the People's Republic of China." The letter states:

"Recent reports raise significant national security concerns regarding the People's Republic of China's access to sensitive US technology and information."

Congress, it says, needs to determine the extent to which national security may have been compromised. As IBTimes Singapore points out, though, the letter cites neither specific reports nor evidence of a security leak. It also doesn't claim that Nvidia knowingly dealt with Chinese intelligence. This is an informal briefing, not testimony under oath.

How Nvidia, China and Megaspeed responded

Nvidia rejects the allegations and calls the contacts ordinary business dealings. According to BigGo Finance, a spokesperson told CNBC that Jensen Huang regularly meets executives and doesn't share any information affecting national security with them. Data Center Dynamics reports that Huang called the allegations "groundless speculation." The Chinese embassy in Washington also rejected them.

This isn't the first time Megaspeed has come under fire. In 2025, the NYT and Bloomberg reported that the company was helping get Nvidia hardware into China despite the embargo. It is also said to run GPUs in Malaysia and Indonesia that apparently serve customers in China remotely. Megaspeed said at the time that it complies with all laws, including US export controls, and that several investigations had found no violations. Nvidia's compliance team (the internal unit that checks whether laws and rules are being followed) says it found nothing suspicious. According to DCD, Singapore police are still investigating Megaspeed.

Background: the fight over AI chips for China

The case hits a sore spot. Before the US restricted exports, about a fifth of Nvidia's revenue came from China. According to DCD, Nvidia and Jensen Huang have lobbied hard for access to that market, with private dinners with Trump and a $20 million donation toward the new White House ballroom. Some Biden-era restrictions have since been eased: Nvidia's H200 GPUs can now be shipped to China in limited quantities, with the US government taking a 25 percent cut. China, for its part, restricts imports itself to boost domestic chipmakers.

At the same time, several cases show how leaky the controls are. According to BigGo Finance, a security firm found 32 Nvidia B300 GPUs, which are on the US export control list, apparently in use at China Telecom. Investigators also documented a workaround: decommissioned server chips with HBM memory (extremely fast stacked memory that sits right next to the chip and can't be sold to China) were rerouted through Hong Kong, where the memory was desoldered and reused. And in March, Wally Liaw, co-founder of server maker Supermicro, was arrested. He's accused of smuggling $2.5 billion worth of Nvidia servers into China. He has pleaded not guilty, and Supermicro denies any wrongdoing.

Our take

The case shows how central AI chips have become to geopolitics. Whoever has Nvidia's top hardware can train large AI models, and China is apparently willing to deploy its intelligence services to get there. If the reports are accurate, this wasn't just about siphoning off technical details but also about political influence: getting Nvidia to push harder in Washington for exports to China. The awkward part is that Nvidia has been doing exactly that for years anyway.

A lot remains unclear, though. All the core claims come from anonymous intelligence sources quoted by the NYT. There's no public evidence, and according to US officials, Jensen Huang knew nothing about the alleged espionage. The government's handling also raises questions: why wasn't Nvidia warned? There are no direct financial consequences for now, and no new restrictions have been announced. But the process adds pressure for stricter export licensing and could make Nvidia's lobbying for the Chinese market considerably harder. Whether Huang will show up on November 18 should be clear by November 11.