2007 worst ever year for data protection

Last year was the worst ever for data losses in the UK, with almost 37 million people having their private data compromised.

The government's loss of 25 million child benefit records was the largest single screw-up, but other government departments and private companies played their part too.

"There is simply no way that any democratic government can expect an unwilling public to accept having their precious personal data cropped and stored in the world's largest database when they aren't confident that database will be safe."

In total, 36,989,300 people in the UK have had their private records compromised.