Giant corporations are employing highly unethical or illegal tools of espionage against nonprofit organizations with near impunity, according to a new report by Essential Information.
The report, titled
Spooky Business, documents how corporations hire shady investigative firms staffed with former employees of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), National Security Agency (NSA), US military, Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), Secret Service, and local police departments to target nonprofit organizations.
“Corporate espionage against nonprofit organizations is an egregious abuse of corporate power that is subverting democracy,” said Gary Ruskin, author of Spooky Business. “Who will rein in the forces of corporate lawlessness as they bear down upon nonprofit defenders of justice?”
Many of the world’s largest corporations and their trade associations -- including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Walmart, Monsanto, Bank of America, Dow Chemical, Kraft, Coca-Cola, Chevron, Burger King, McDonald’s, Shell, BP, BAE, Sasol, Brown & Williamson, and E.ON -- have been linked to espionage or planned espionage against nonprofit organizations, activists, and whistleblowers.
Many different types of nonprofit organizations have been targeted with corporate espionage, including environmental,
anti-war, public interest, consumer, food safety,
pesticide reform, nursing home reform, gun control, social justice,
animal rights, and arms control groups.
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