Corporate spying on the rise in India
By siliconindia   |   Saturday, 25 September 2010, 00:07 IST   |    7 Comments
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Corporate spying on the rise in India
Bangalore:With the digital medium offering an extremely fertile ground for its perpetuation, corporate spying is on the rise in the country. The number of companies hiring private detectives to keep tabs on both their employees and business partners are increasing day by day. Detective agencies says that there is a new notion coming up with strange requests from companies to plant spies in rival firms, to fish for confidential data, engineering designs, software codes or to manipulate rate contracts to favour their clients. It is turning out to be a huge industry and on an average, detective agencies get 5 to 10 requests a day for such services. The fee could range from Rs 30,000 to a few lakh of rupees, depending on the complexity of the job. A survey conducted by KPMG reveals that losses on account of corporate spying in the consumer products segment is as high as 13 percent. Some 82 percent of the worst frauds are committed by the enemy within, acting alone or in collusion with a third party, says an Ernst & Young study. Hiring spies is prevalent in IT firms, especially where big tenders are underway. Often the needle of suspicion is on new recruits. "We get requests especially from IT and banking clients to keep a watch on their new employees. We cracked a case where an employee was transferring data via his mobile phone. We launched a trail and caught him accepting physical payments three days after the crime," says Pradeep Kumar, Director, Times Detective Agency. Unfortunately, due to the inherent nature of corporate espionage, there is virtually no reporting. There is complete absence of case laws in this regard. The police and law enforcement must create a friendly atmosphere to enable the reporting of such instances.

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