Land Registry goes electronic

The Land Registry has announced that all documents relating to home titles and plans will now be stored electronically. No paper copies will be kept, and existing documents will be destroyed after being digitised.

The electronic database will not make any new information available that was not previously accessible by making an application on paper. A spokesperson for the Land Registry confirmed that no signatures will be posted online, unlike the Planning Office scheme of putting applications online.

Members of the public can search for property details on the Land Registry Online site and then order the Title Register and the Title Plan for £2 each.

Some information from the Land Registry is sold to third party companies. However, it was quick to point out that this is restricted solely to the cost of the house, with no personal details being released.

This information has been used in websites such as Housepricemaps, which combines house price information from the Land Registry.

The Land registry expects to add around 10,000 documents every day to a database with more than 20 million records. Details of how the data is kept safe are something of a secret, for "security reasons", but the Land Registry emphasised that there is no question about the safety of the records.

Old documents that have been left in storage after being scanned will be destroyed.