The "Dirty Tricks" scandal was a series of concerted campaigns by British Airways (BA) in the 1990s seeking to undermine their rival, Virgin Atlantic. Concerned by the prospect of an upcoming challenger, Lord King, Chairman of British Airways, told his chief executive "do something about Branson". The ensuing campaign involved BA representatives impersonating Virgin employees and calling up Virgin customers to try to get them to switch their flights to BA as well as hacking computers to gain access to insider information on Virgin's flights.
In 1992, Virgin Group chairman, Richard Branson sued BA, and the ensuing highly publicised court battle resulted in Virgin winning £3.51 million in compensation; the highest sum ever won for defamation.