“Every spy agency in the world uses this. It's the stuff of spy novels because it is a technique that works. … A CEO of an American technology company, no matter who it is, should expect to be a target of industrial espionage.”
The Bulwark · Policy · November 2026
Context
The host asked how common honey traps really are, given that officials believe that is what happened to the Nvidia CEO. Barnes said the technique is tried and true and that anyone controlling critical technology should be warned they are a target.
Transcript
…Alice Wong was trying to either gather information or influence Jensen Wong. So we have not seen the transcripts. We are not going to see the transcript of these intercepted calls. That is the most classified intelligence the U.S. has. But this is the kind of place that this information comes from.
I'm just curious, how common are these kinds of honey traps, if in fact, intelligence officials think it was a honey trap?
Look, every spy agency in the world uses this, right? Like, you know, it's the stuff of spy novels because it is kind of a technique that works. Like middle-aged man, like young. Intelligence officer, like it's a way to get information, and it's kind of tried and true. If you are the CEO of a world-leading company, if you are the person with access and control over the most important technology in the world, you know, your people should explain to you that you are a target, not just of the Chinese intelligence, but of intelligence agencies around the world. Like, this, you know, a CEO of an American technology company, no matter who it is, should expect to be target of industrial espionage.
I would also add to that that Alice Wong, from what we know about her, does not seem to be your typical kind of, you know, your typical honey trap, I guess. She's not, she doesn't, she was actually the CEO of a legitimate company that was spun off from a company backed by Alibaba. She seems to have…
an important point, right? Because we do not know exactly when Alice Wong was recruited here, right? So Alice, it's important to understand that, like, let's take the Red Sparrow novels there, right? Like, the person doing the honey traps in those novels is a Russian case officer, right? They were…
it's a Singaporean company. Is she a Singaporean national or a Chinese national?
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