The UK’s Financial Services Authority brought illegal insider trading charges against seven people today, alleging that traded on information provided by two investment bank employees.

The FSA charged seven people with 13 counts relating to an alleged conspiracy to deal on inside information. It claims that the illegal trading took place a two-year-period and involved unlawful profits of about £2.5 million. None of these allegations have been proven, and the investment banks involved in the case have not been named. The first court appearance is scheduled for April 14.

Among the companies that the FSA claims had their shares illegally traded are former Canadian transportation firm Laidlaw International Inc., which was acquired by UK-based FirstGroup plc in 2007; and Reuters Group plc, which agreed to merge with Canada’s Thomson Corp. in 2007.

The charges follow the searches and arrest of eight suspects in July 2008, they are not related to the raids conducted earlier this month by the FSA, involving a hedge fund and other financial firms.

The regulator says that the 21-month investigation involved a team of 35 investigators, lawyers and support staff examining more than 75 electronic devices containing more than 200,000 electronic files, 130 individual trading accounts, analyzing more than 150,000 entries of publicly available information and taking more than 250 witness statements.