From the top of the Gherkin building in London, Crispin Sturrock points out an anonymous-looking office block in the swirling snow below. “There’s a device in there,” says the chief executive of White Rock Defence Systems, an information security consultancy that helps companies protect themselves against spies. “They’re not clients of ours, but whenever we scan for transmissions in nearby buildings, we pick it up. It’s been there for ages, just streaming information out.” The building in question is bugged with an electronic device transmitting information about one of its tenants. In the era of WikiLeaks, it is tempting to view all leaks as news headlines. But in general, corporate leaks tend to be of interest only to a very small group of people – an organisation’s competitors or potential buyer. “The reasons people engage in competitive information gathering are usually financial gain and leverage,” says Mr Sturrock. Some cases of corporate espionage have, of course, made it to the news pages. In 2006, Hewlett-Packard was investigated in the US by the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, the California attorney-general’s office and the Securities and Exchange Commission for spying on its board members’ e-mails and telephone records. It led to a number of resignations. And in a lawsuit filed last year, Starwood, the hotel chain, alleged that former executives had left the company to join Hilton, the hotel group, armed with confidential information. Hilton says the allegations are without merit. Mr Sturrock says: “High-profile cases are very few and far between. Ideally, the competition should never know you have spied on them because it ruins your chances of doing so in the future.” Moreover, the information might not be put to use immediately. If the spy is smart, he says, they “might be working to a five-year plan. It’s like poker. You don’t win every hand. Rather, you play the game until the jackpot gets big enough.” The jackpot can be phenomenal – tens of thousands spent on corporate espionage can result in a payback in the millions.