Competitive intelligence good in business says British Council

Competitive intelligence good in business says British Council
BY HENRY MCHAZIME
13:19:40 - 19 January 2009

British Council Malawi says it is better for local businesses to engage in competitive intelligence gathering rather than industrial espionage.

Council Director Marc Jessel said this in Blantyre on Friday during first forum in 2009 for Management Express held under the theme of “Influence of espionage in business”.

Zain Malawi Managing Director Fayaz King, who presented a paper at the function, described industrial espionage as obtaining information considered secret or confidential without permission.

“In business, this is done for commercial reasons and the tactics used are beyond acceptable,” said King, indicating that competitors use spy agents to hack into IT systems and even gather confidential papers from garbage bins.

He added that only 20 percent of corporate espionage cases are detected and that from that figure, a mere 10 percent of the cases are resolved.

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