​Private Investigation has again come to the forefront in an episode of Channel 4's dispatches. "Watching the Detectives" which aired on Monday 14^th May at 8pm and is available now on 4oD follows the stories of three volunteers who agreed for their identities to be used. Journalists then approached two PI firms and asked for detailed background checks on the subjects. They were told they could be given information on the subjects schooling, friends, relationships and jobs.

In many cases this type of information is available in the public domain if you are willing to spend time looking for it. Social networking sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn hold a lot of personal information and often lax privacy settings allow strangers access to your details, conversations and photographs. If you are worried about your Facebook privacy settings these can be changed by clicking on the downward facing arrow in the top right hand corner whilst logged in to your account. Click on "Privacy Settings" and you can decide exactly who is able to see which parts of your profile. You can do the same on most networking sites including LinkedIn where you can choose who can see your activity feed and connections.

The investigators then started offering information which is definitely not readily available. Criminal and financial records, medical histories and private communications were all given a price despite their illegality. A cost of £900 was attributed to a month's bank statement, £350 for a National Insurance number and £460 for medical information. Breaching the Data Protection act can result in fines of up to £500,000, a menial amount for large corporations, but more importantly prison sentences.

Whilst the programme seemed to suggest that information may easily be obtained on the internet the reality is that the illegal information they obtained, which was not in the public domain, was obtained in one of two ways; blagging or insider information.

Blagging is when a PI or anyone else pretends to be someone else, usually over the phone or via email, in order to illegally obtain information.

Insider information is the more prominent method and is as old as the hills. Certain PI's will recruit 'informants' within different organisations in order to access information for payment. Typically they will endeavour to have 'contacts' within the banks, medical profession, police, criminal justice departments and the communications industry.

When the News of the World scandal first surfaced people were led to believe that certain PI's had almost supernatural powers to access all sorts of things. The public imagined that PI's could personally 'hack into' everything from emails to mobile phones. The reality is more likely to be that the PI's in question recruited 'contacts' within certain communication companies who would do that work for them in exchange for cash. That's why the payments for the private information on 'Watching the Detectives' were so high. A percentage of those payments would have to go to the contact within the particular organisation who obtained the information on their behalf. Obtaining this type of information is usually referred to under the guise of 'intelligence gathering'. Without doubt there is a lot of information that can now be obtained over the internet if you have the know how. However, the majority of top grade 'insider information' or intelligence will usually be obtained via third party contacts or informants.

Public authorities such as the Police, Revenues & Customs, Immigration Dept, Dept of Work & Pensions, the Security Services etc, have long since used informants in this way. The difference is that they have to adhere to the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) which provides guidance as to how and when The Data Protection Act and The Human Rights Act can be legally breached, for example "in the interests of national security", "prevention of terrorism" for "for the economic well-being of the UK". RIPA is geared towards Public Authorities, not PI's.

The answer is to regulate the industry. The Security Industry Authority (SIA) tried to do this 10 years ago but it has yet to come to fruition. The on-going revelations from the Leveson Enquiry will likely bring further pressure to bear on the Government to finally introduce legislation and regulation for the Private Investigation Industry.

Ultimate Security & Investigations Ltd works to the demands of RIPA and the principles of the Human Rights Act which state that investigation methods should be 'proportionate, necessary, justifiable and legal when considering the context of an investigation'.