The department for Business, Energy and Industrial strategy (BEIS) lost 306 mobile and laptop devices in the last two years.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request by Parliament Street Think Tank found that the gadgets were lost or stolen during the calendar years 2019 and 2020.

The FOI revealed that in total 234 mobiles and 72 laptops were lost or stolen during this time. In 2019, 156 mobiles were either lost or stolen and in 2020, 77 laptops were either lost or stolen.

A total of 43 laptops were lost or stolen in 2019. These included 26 laptops stolen and 17 laptops lost in 2019 and 10 laptops lost, while 19 were stolen in 2020.

When it comes to mobiles, in 2019, there was 126 mobiles reported lost and 30 stolen. Then in 2020, these figures decreased slightly and only 65 mobiles were classed as lost and 13 stolen.

Commenting on the figures Edward Blake, area vice president at Absolute Software UK&I said: “Amidst the chaos caused by Covid-19, managing a large, distributed workforce is no easy task, and keeping tabs on valuable devices like laptops is growing increasingly difficult.

“However, if one of these lost devices ends up in the wrong hands, the organisation in question could be facing a far more costly predicament than first anticipated. For example, sophisticated cyber criminals can steal the data contained on these devices, access more businesses files, or intercept emails between colleagues, all with relative ease once a device has been compromised.”


He concluded: “It is more critical than ever to have a permanent digital connection to every endpoint, as well as the ability to lock, freeze or wipe the device if it is at risk of being compromised.”

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