http://thediplomat.com/2014/05/robert-g ... espionage/According to [Robert] Gates, however, China is not alone in using its intelligence capabilities for comparative economic advantage, nor is this kind of espionage particularly new. Gates specifically singled out France as particularly aggressive in its use of economic espionage.
“In terms of the next capable next to the Chinese are probably the French. And they’ve been doing it a long time,” Gates said. “France has been a mercantilist country. The government and business have operated hand-in-hand since the time of Louis XIV. This is not exactly a new development in France.”
Gates went on to explain that for years now the “French Intelligence Services have been breaking into the hotel rooms of American businessmen and surreptitiously downloading their laptops, if they felt those laptops had technological information, or competitive information that would be useful to French” companies.
