Usually concerned with top secret matters affecting national security, Britain's eavesdropping spy agency GCHQ just happened to be on the lookout for leaks of a yet-to-be-published Harry Potter book.
Shortly before the publication of one of the volumes in J.K. Rowling's seven-part wizarding saga, with millions of fans worldwide at a fever pitch of anticipation, publisher Nigel Newton received an unexpected phone call.
"I remember the British spy eavesdropping station GCHQ rang me up and said 'we've detected an early copy of this book on the internet'," Newton said in a recent interview.
According to reports, the call was in 2005 and the book was The Half-Blood Prince.
"I got him to read a page to our editor and she said 'no, that's a fake'," said Newton, founder and chief executive of Potter publishing house Bloomsbury, describing the spies as "good guys".
