Italian finance police are reviewing a list of more than 7,000 account holders from HSBC’s Swiss private bank as they probe possible tax evasion or money laundering, according to a police spokesman, Bloomberg reported.

The investigation is being conducted after a Turin-based court requested the Italian names on a list obtained by French prosecutor Eric de Montgolfier, said Gian Carlo Caselli, Turin’s chief prosecutor.

The Italian names are on a list of 127,000 accounts belonging to 80,000 people that Herve Falciani, a former computer technician at HSBC’s branch in Geneva, turned over to a court in Nice, France, according to a police spokesman, confirming newspaper reports.

As previously reported by WealthBriefing, a number of governments have sought to buy, or have successfully purchased, information stolen from private banks. Earlier in the noughties, the German government, for example, bought data stolen by an ex-employee of LGT, the Liechtenstein private bank.

The willingness of governments to buy stolen information, while arguably questionable on legal grounds, demonstrates how determined some states are to chase after alleged tax evaders and replenish debt-ravaged national treasuries.

HSBC said in March this year that French authorities had obtained details on about 24,000 accounts – of which 15,000 were active - which were stolen. While that posed a threat to client privacy, the bank said it didn’t believe the stolen data would allow third parties to access the accounts.