Wal-Mart's spy operation

A Wal-Mart worker fired last month for intercepting a
reporter's phone calls says he was part of a larger, sophisticated
surveillance operation that included snooping not only on employees but
also on critics, stockholders and the consulting firm McKinsey.

As
part of the surveillance, the retailer last year got an employee to
infiltrate an anti-Wal-Mart group to determine whether it planned
protests at the company's annual meeting, according to Bruce Gabbard,
the fired security worker, who worked in Wal-Mart Stores' (WMT, news, msgs) Threat Research and Analysis Group.

The
company also deployed cutting-edge monitoring systems made by a
supplier to the Defense Department that allowed it to capture and
record the actions of anyone connected to its global computer network.
The systems' high-tech wizardry could detect the degr