A survey of 2000 taxi drivers across 11 global cities -- including Sydney, San Francisco, Washington, Bombay, and seven European cities -- by mobile security vendor Pointsec found that over the last six months, Londoners left behind 54,874 mobile phones, 4,718 PDAs, 3,179 laptops and 923 thumb drives. However, Londoners were also the most likely to get their devices back, with 96% of phones and 97% of notebooks being reunited with their owners.

Bombay and Sydney came second and third in the rankings for losing mobile phones, while Blackberry-obsessed politicians meant that Washington came second on the PDA listing. Notebooks were most likely to go missing in London, Munich and Bombay.

While the numbers suggest there are plenty of forgetful/stupid mobile device owners, taxi drivers come up in a largely favourable light. Overall, 75% of passengers got their lost mobiles back, and 78% were reunited with their laptops.

One hideous exception was San Francisco, where just 32% of notebook PCs were returned. So if you're going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some extra padlocks on your PC bag.
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