Time Warner tells staff of loss of personal information

Personal information for 600,000 current and former Time Warner employees has been lost, the company has said.

The media giant said the mishap occurred on 22 March, when data storage company Iron Mountain was transporting its backup tapes to a separate storage facility.

The company lost the tapes while in transit, said Kathy McKiernan, a Time Warner spokeswoman.

"The tapes were discovered missing on the same day they were picked up,"she told US news website Cnet.com. "We launched an investigation, and when we could not rule out foul play, we contacted the US Secret Service to investigate."

Time Warner waited for more than a month before notifying current and past employees that their personal information may have been compromised.

"We didn't want to compromise the investigation," McKiernan said. "We determined we could notify people now without it impeding the investigation."