No progress finding lost 999 disc

Almost 900,000 calls to the ambulance service were on the missing disc

Details of almost 900,000 calls to the Scottish Ambulance Service are still missing, Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon has told parliament.

It emerged earlier this week that a portable data disc had been lost while being transported to Manchester by the courier firm TNT.

Ms Sturgeon said the company was still looking for the disc but definite lines of inquiry had run out.

She stressed that the data on the discs could not be easily accessed.

The data was encrypted, there was a 15 item password, and a special file would need to be created to make any sense of the data.

The disc included the names of some patients, addresses of incidents and phone numbers received in calls to the service over the past two years.

Ms Sturgeon said she had been told by the ambulance service that it "also contained necessary operational details including contact details for staff".

She told MSPs: "The Scottish Ambulance Service has assured staff, as I have assured the public, about the steps taken to secure the information before transit."

I want to reassure the people of Scotland that the ambulance service, in preparing for the transfer of the data, took every possible effort to ensure its security Nicola Sturgeon

Ms Sturgeon said that by noon on Wednesday there had been 21 calls made to a helpline, with 13 of these from members of the public.

She added: "Hopefully this reflects the reassurance we and the ambulance service have given the public and staff."

"I want to reassure the people of Scotland that the ambulance service, in preparing for the transfer of the data, took every possible effort to ensure its security."

The health secretary insisted that the situation was in "complete contrast" to the loss of 25 million child benefit records by Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs.

Ms Sturgeon said: "That personal data, which included bank account details, was not similarly protected."

The minister also told MSPs that a review had found that public bodies across Scotland generally had high standards of data handling.

But she added: "There are still areas where improvements can, and will, be made and there is of course absolutely no room for complacency."

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