Parts of the media are fuelling a growing black market in the “secret” details of people’s private lives, Britain’s information watchdog claims today.

Richard Thomas, the Information Commissioner, says that there is a widespread and organised undercover market in confidential personal information, and that many of the ultimate buyers are journalists looking for a story.

Others involved in the trade include finance companies, local authorities trying to trace debtors, insurance firms and estranged couples seeking their former partners.

One of Mr Thomas’s investigations, Operation Motorman, found that information had been supplied to 305 journalists identified as customers of a private detective working in Hampshire. He had supplied newspapers with details of criminal records, driving licences, ex-directory telephone numbers, itemised telephone bills, mobile telephone records and telephone numbers of friends and families.

Mr Thomas lists the newspapers and magazines found to have been using the services of the private investigator in What Price Privacy Now? published today.

The Daily Mail tops the list with almost 1,000 transactions involving 58 journalists or clients acting on their behalf, followed by The People with 802 transactions, the Daily Mirror, 681, The Mail on Sunday, 266, the News of the World, 182, and the Sunday Mirror, 143.

Mr Thomas said that some of the cases and information sought by the media could have involved issues of public interest but added that no one interviewed or prosecuted in the Operation Motorman case had raised such a defence.

The private detective involved had pleaded guilty to obtaining, disclosing or procuring the disclosure of confidential information without the consent of the organisation holding that information and was given a conditional discharge.

Mr Thomas says the punishment should be two years in jail. This would bring the law into line with the penalty for anyone found to be misusing information held on the planned national identity register.

A statement from Associated Newspapers, owners of the Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday, last night said that in common with all newspapers and broadcasters — and many other organisations, including lawyers — it uses search agencies to obtain information entirely legitimately from a range of public sources, including company records, electoral rolls, registers of births, marriages and deaths, and the Land Registry.

The statement adds: “The Information Commissioner’s data appears to come from an inquiry into the activities of one particular agency nearly five years ago which resulted in four people, not journalists, receiving conditional discharges.

“It is worth stressing that as the ‘league table’ is a snapshot based on the activities of just one agency, its figures are utterly meaningless.”

It concludes: “Since the Information Commissioner first raised his concerns, Associated Newspapers has repeatedly stressed to all its journalists that they must observe the law when seeking information.”

Leak league

Transactions/Journalists

Daily Mail - 952/58

Sunday People - 802/50

Daily Mirror - 681/45

Mail on Sunday - 266/33

News of the World - 182/19

Sunday Mirror - 143/25

Best Magazine - 134/20

Evening Standard - 130/1

The Observer - 103/4

Daily Sport - 62/4

Sunday Times - 52/7

The People - 37/19

Daily Express - 36/7

Weekend Magazine (Daily Mail) - 30/4

Sunday Express - 29/8

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