Monte is a spy from the old school, a self-described "old-world chauvinist" who hires "stunners" - beautiful women - to get information out of men. He runs two spy schools, one in Sydney and one in New York, to teach people the business and train his agents. He has 60 operatives working for him around the world, half of them employed full-time. Nobody knows more about spying today than Frank Monte.

GALLERY: You've been a private eye for more than 30 years. How has business changed over that time?

MONTE: Nobody really wants to work anymore. Since the mid-70's you no longer find those guys who are really crazy workaholics and love what they do. There was a gap in the beginning of the '80s when a lot of people didn't do this work because the divorce laws changed. Then it started up again with a lot of cops getting into it. People think this pertains only to legal cases and trying to get a statement. The real world of the private eye is not taking statements. Trouble is cops get involved, take a statement, and look for someone to arrest.

What is the real world of a private eye?

It's actually all the hard work of surveillance, breaking and entering, bugging, and buying information. It takes getting into places and living in a boarding house somewhere to find out what somebody across the street is doing.

Has the type of spying changed?

In the old days, you'd help the public. Now, you don't really want to care about the public because the only ones who realize when they're hurt are the corporations. And when they're hurt, they open up the checkbook in a real hurry and throw it at you. In the late '80s we were doing a huge job that was never publicized - and never will be really - in the Nabisco takeover. Six agencies worked on that and a total of $6 million was paid to them. The bosses just wanted results. Get this bloody information. Tiny little bits of information - one figure is all they wanted. And we were getting it. But the figure changed every few weeks.

The U.S. Government said that corporate espionage cost businesses in this country $100 billion a year. Do you think it's that big a problem?

It's a huge problem that sometimes is not talked about because boards of directors don't want shareholders to realize what the problem is. A lot of times I've worked for people who have paid me under the table. They say to me, "Keep this off the record, don't start a file." One huge company was having its products stolen straight out of the factory every week. It was done from within the company, naturally. The board eventually just wrote it off as a computer error. They paid me very well, and it never came to light. You find out who is guilty. You don't necessarily go to court.