LONDON — The British government was reeling under a political firestorm Wednesday brought on by revelations that the personal identity and banking details of 25 million Britons had been lost in the government's internal mail system.
Treasury chancellor Alistair Darling called the loss a "catastrophic" and "unforgivable" breach. Government officials acknowledged that they still had no idea what happened to a pair of computer disks that contained birth dates, addresses, government ID numbers and bank account details for nearly every family in Britain with a child under the age of 16.
Financial analysts said the missing information could allow anyone who found it to apply for loans or even mortgages under an adopted identity. Child welfare workers said the loss compromised children's safety because the disks contained the names, birth dates and addresses of millions of children. Banks were bracing for a flood of queries from account holders worried that their account security could be compromised.
The government of Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who has been in office only five months, is taking a pummeling over the security breach, mainly because it is not the first. At least two other significant security lapses have occurred under his watch.
The new crisis follows the Brown government's controversial bailout of the nation's fifth-largest mortgage lender, Northern Rock, after fallout from the sub-prime lending crisis in the United States in September led to the first run on a British bank in more than a century. Already over the weekend, Brown's approval rating had slipped to 33%, compared with 48% during his first full month in office in July.
"I profoundly regret and apologize for the inconvenience and worries that have been caused to millions of families who receive child benefit," Brown said as he underwent a blistering attack in the House of Commons, the lower house of Parliament.
Wednesday was the second day in a row that opposition leaders criticized the government for what appears to be a government data loss of unusual proportions, involving up to 41% of the population.
The loss involves records on Britons who receive government stipends of about $38 a week for their children under the age of 16 -- nearly all British families with children, because there are no income restrictions on the payments.
The payments are often deposited directly into families' bank accounts, meaning account numbers and routing codes are included in a large number of files.
