Exclusive: 'Bigger than phone hacking' - Soca sat on blue-chip dirty tricks evidence for years

Exclusive: 'Bigger than phone hacking' - Soca sat on blue-chip dirty tricks evidence for years

Angry MPs join calls for secret list of those involved as banks and pharmaceutical firms are linked to rogue private investigators

Tom Harper



Banks and pharmaceutical companies are on a secret list of blue-chip firms that hired private investigators who break the law, The Independent has learned.

The revelation that firms from two of this country’s biggest industries may have commissioned corrupt PIs – without facing prosecution – will fuel concerns that corporations potentially involved in the unlawful trade in private information have so far escaped proper investigation

This newspaper has previously revealed that law firms, insurance companies and financial services organisations have used PIs for years to obtain a range of private data.

Information on the banks and pharmaceutical companies is contained in an explosive list of corrupt PIs’ clients handed to a parliamentary committee by the Serious Organised Crime Agency (Soca