'Facebook generation with little regard for secrecy' blamed for losing MoD's 130 laptops to theft

Some 130 laptops belonging to the Ministry of Defence were stolen last year, a report revealed yesterday.

One which contained the personal records of 600,000 Army recruits was stolen from a parked car in Birmingham last January.

But yesterday's report showed that the incident was just one of hundreds in recent years.

It warned that the 'Facebook Generation' do not understand the culture of security which was ingrained in older colleagues during the Cold War.

The review, by Information Advisory Council chairman Sir Edmund Burton, also warned that the MoD's budget problems mean it does not have enough computer security specialists to keep data safe.

It added that basic security discipline within the MoD has been forgotten, and there is 'little awareness' of the danger of losing sensitive information.

One huge database carrying details of 600,000 recruits or potential recruits - as well as 400,000 parents and referees - was stored on 51 separate MOD laptops, investigators found.

Four of those have been stolen since 2004, but only the most recent case led to any disciplinary action.

The MoD has a total of 35,000 laptops - 12,000 of which have no encryption capability  - and 130 were stolen or lost in 2007.

Staff also lost 58 hand-held computers or memory drives last year, but there are no accurate records of how many of these it owns.