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IF ANY doubts remained about the urgent need for a national data disclosure law, they will have been banished by the revelation that the Comptroller and Auditor General's office failed to disclose - for 16 months - the theft of a laptop which included personal details of 380,000 social welfare recipients.

The comptroller's office also revealed that 106,000 of the records included highly sensitive bank account data. None of the data were encrypted, an appalling disregard for this most basic of digital security provisions. And while it was said there was no indication the information had been used in a compromising way, such assurances will provide little comfort to the 380,000 individuals whose information is exactly the kind of material that quickly makes its way on to criminal websites, where it is sold in cheap bundles to hackers and identity thieves.