Peter Humphrey and his American wife Yu Yingzeng were detained in Shanghai on July 10 as police investigated bribery accusations against British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). The police said Humphrey and Yu broke the law on 10 different occasions.
The move shows the government is closing in on research firms who provide information to foreign companies operating in a country where official data is either insufficient or suspect.
Humphrey (57) is a former journalist. He is the founder of ChinaWhys, a risk management firm that provides services to multinationals.
Discussing the formal arrest of Humphrey which took place on August 19, State broadcaster CCTV showed two people handcuffed with their faces blurred. The man said, "I deeply regret this matter and I apologise to the Chinese government."
A police investigator told state media that the couple wantonly obtained a lot of information on home registrations, international travel, and property records. They sold the information to lawyers, multinational companies and financial institutions, CCTV said.
Humphrey's company said that it specializes in "discreet risk mitigation solutions, consulting and investigation services to corporate clients in matters of high sensitivity across Greater China and the Asia Pacific".
The State media also released details of what it described as the "worst ever" cyber attack in the country last Sunday when hackers took down the Chinese domain name with the suffix .cn. The attack resulted in thousands of websites going temporarily offline although most were restored within a few hours.
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