surreptitiously

After the alleged extortion started, Huang said, he hired an attorney and a private detective and began surreptitiously recording conversations with the defendants.

So brazen were her efforts that, in one instance, she surreptitiously added a Chinese official to a private state government call about the public health response to the virus, according to prosecutors.

Federal law requires reimbursement only for unauthorized transactions, such as when someone hacks into your account or surreptitiously uses an app on your phone to make payments.

This year, a former Caltrans executive said she was demoted after raising concerns about a repaving project that surreptitiously widened 3½ miles of the freeway where the toll lanes were being proposed.

Both articles were produced during a period when the newspaper has acknowledged paying the private detective explicitly to obtain material surreptitiously.