Corporate Espionage and Misuse of Sensitive Data
A serious espionage scandal in Italy has revealed how major corporations, including Big Alcohol giant Heineken and Big Oil giant Shell, were connected to an illegal surveillance operation targeting private individuals, authorities, and competitors. As reported by NL Times, the Italian company Equalize is at the heart of the case, accused of stealing and trading confidential tax and police data with hundreds of corporate clients.
The growing investigation has shed light on the lengths to which Big Alcohol and Big Oil are willing to go to protect their market dominance and silence scrutiny.
Equalize officially offered services such as business intelligence and reputation management, but Italian authorities discovered a darker side to its operations. According to NL Times, the company accessed police databases, tax authority systems, and the national financial intelligence unit’s reporting center by hacking and leveraging insider informants within state institutions. The stolen information was then sold to private clients for use in internal investigations, competitive tracking, and even personal retaliation.
Heineken’s Role Through Its Italian Subsidiary
Heineken, through its Italian distribution subsidiary Partesa, is listed among Equalize’s clients.
As NRC revealed, Partesa allegedly paid at least €30,000 to surveil eight current and former employees who had left the company for a competitor. Equalize’s espionage included planting spyware on at least two employees’ phones.
This level of corporate intrusion raises serious concerns about the alcohol industry’s surveillance practices and disregard for human and civil rights, such as individual privacy.
Heineken responded by stating it severed ties with Equalize as soon as it became aware of the company’s illegal methods and is cooperating with the authorities. However, this revelation adds to existing evidence of unethical practices by Heineken and within the alcohol industry more broadly. As studies have previously documented, the alcohol industry routinely uses aggressive and unethical lobbying, data manipulation, and surveillance tactics to expand sales and undermine public health focused alcohol policy initiatives.
Why This Matters for Alcohol Policy
This case is not just about corporate misconduct. It highlights how major actors in the alcohol industry are willing to exploit illegal means to protect their market control. The misuse of data and surveillance against employees is deeply concerning. It emphasises the urgent need for better and more comprehensive oversight and regulation of the alcohol industry. It also underlines the need for more robust protections of and transparency in alcohol policy initiatives.
Research has consistently emphasised that the alcohol industry poses a serious threat to people’s health and democracy through its political interference, unethical practices, and resistance to evidence-based alcohol policy.
Movendi International’s Big Alcohol Exposed initiative, with support by RESET Alcohol, has documented 20 cases of sabotage by Heineken.
Sabotage is Big Alcohol’s deliberate actions to damage and obstruct people’s access to public goods. Heineken’s sabotage strategy comprises calculated actions to break and undermine society’s rules, laws, and regulations.
This strategy also includes wilful activity that jeopardises people’s access to essential resources such as water and basic food, as well as civil rights.
And it includes Big Alcohol’s deliberate activities to damage or disrupt the proper functioning of society’s institutions, preventing them from addressing alcohol-related harm in the public interest. Examples of this strategy include corruption, bribery, tax evasion and avoidance, price-fixing cartels, violations of alcohol marketing rules, and other unethical practices, such as espionage.
Heineken’s latest scandal offers further proof of how the beer giant operates far outside ethical boundaries.
The Italian espionage case is ongoing. As more facts come to light, it will be critical to ensure accountability for those involved.