Contractors have been sorting through Salisbury householders’ rubbish to check whether they are recycling enough.
But Wiltshire Council denies they were prying or invading people’s privacy.
It says they were simply carrying out surveys to assess what was being thrown away in general, and not examining what was in any single bin.
The former Salisbury District Council was among 87 authorities identified in a Daily Telegraph article as having secretly “snooped” through bins.
Read more in Salisbury Journal.