The figures released in the Data Protection Commissioner’s Annual Report for 2012 show that the Office dealt with 188 more claims in 2012 than 2011.

As well as this, an audit of An Garda Síochána, revealed that two "high-profile figures", three media personalities, and a "well-known inter-county GAA player" had their PULSE records repeatedly accessed for no obvious reason.

As a result of this, a reason must be inputting when accessing this extremely sensitive information, with Gardaí being informed that there will be "no expections" to this rule.

A "disturbing failure of governance" was also noted in some Department of Social Protection offices, where information stored on the INFOSYS system of a claimant were passed on to a third-party.

The Data Protection Commissioner said while sharing data between government organisations is beneficial, INFOSYS needs to overhauled before any other organisations are allow to access it.

Although the overall rise in investigations is small, the Office notes a significant surge in of claims made under Privacy in Electronics Regulations.

These relate to unsolicited emails, SMS messages, and phone calls, including automated calling services.

The number of complaints in this area tripled in 2012 to 606.

A spokesperson for the Office noted that this rise was likely due to 2012 being the first full year of these regulations being enforced after they were introduced in July of 2011.

The Office audited a total of 40 organisations, and although they noted that most of those visited had a high awareness of Data Protection requirements, "majority... had areas where immediate remedial action was necessary."

Data Commissioner Billy Hawkes hinted at a further need to boost staffing at the Office as their workload may increase again under new EU guidelines.

He welcomed the Government increasing funding and staffing levels at the Office, which he had stressed the need for in the 2011 report.

There was also a 25% rise in the number of personal data security breach, where data controllers have not put proper encryption practices in place, to 1,592.

Some of the most high-profile cases the office dealt with this year include the High Court ruling that Dublin Bus must supply CCTV footage when requested, following on from an incident where a woman injured herself on a bus. Only 32 claims relating to CCTV were made in 2012.

There was also a prosecution made against Meteor and eMobile after two laptops, containing the information of 10,000 customers, went missing.