Ever wondered where in the world you can find the most Crooks, Cranks and Losers?

Or, come to that, the places overrun by people called Smith or Jones?

Well, wonder no more. A website launched today can tell you everything you could possibly want to know about surnames  -  unusual or otherwise.

Pure Klass: Myleene

It uses more than one billion records to show which countries, regions and cities have the greatest concentrations of a given surname.

Simply by typing in a name, anyone can work out where their ancestors are likely to have originated  -  and where their distant relatives have ended up.

The site exploits the fact that most people do not move far from the place they are born, despite the ease of modern transport and communications.

Regions where surnames are most heavily concentrated tend to be the regions from where they originated.

The site's creators believe it will be invaluable for those tracing their family tree and for social historians charting the patterns of migration.

It shows that the name 'Crank' originates in the north-west of England, although Cranks are now more concentrated in the U.S. state of Arkansas.

And while Carlisle is the top city in the world to find a Crook, you're most likely to come across a Loser in Switzerland.

The site is the brainchild of researchers at University College London. It follows the success of a website which showed concentrations of names in the UK.

Professor Paul Longley, who launched the site at the Royal Geographical Society's conference in London, said: 'If you looked up a name on the previous website you could see where Anglo-Saxon names originated in the 12th and 13th centuries.

'This websites broadens the previous one and looks at the distribution of names in 26 countries.

'It means we have names representative of one billion people in the world.'

He added: 'A name doesn't just tell you who you are  -  but where you are, where you came from and where your family has gone.'

The site reveals some surprising things about the family origins of our top politicians.

Although there is a famous cluster of Camerons in London's Notting Hill, the website shows that the family name probably originated in the Highlands.

However, the highest concentrations of Camerons is now in New Zealand, followed by Australia and Canada.

Professor Longley suspects that the Conservative leader's ancestors left Scotland after the Highland-clearances of the 18th century, when people were forcibly removed from their homes. 

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'We found that a lot of Scottish names are concentrated in Australia  -  particularly South Australia and Tasmania. My hypothesis is that these areas were settled at the time as the Scottish clearances,' he said.

Blairs are also most concentrated in New Zealand, whereas Thatchers are most likely to be found in Australia.

Some rather less distinguished names can also be found on the website. There are, for instance, no Hitlers left in Germany. However, there is a sizeable population of them in Delhi, India.

• The name tracer can be found at publicprofiler.org/worldnames