Mobile Users' Data Peddled to Police by British Research Firm

Included users' movements

THE data of 27m mobile phone users has been offered for sale to the Metropolitan police, private companies and other bodies, enabling them to track users' movements.

Ipsos Mori, one of Britain's biggest research firms, has been caught offering text and call records for sale.

The company has claimed in meetings that every movement by users can be tracked to within 100 metres. This weekend the Met, which has been in talks with Ipsos Mori about paying for some of the controversial data, shelved any deal after being contacted by The Sunday Times.

Documents to promote the data reveal that it includes "gender, age, postcode, websites visited, time of day text is sent [and] location of customer when call is made".

They state that people's mobile phone use and location can be tracked in real time with records of movements, calls and texts also available for the previous six months.