PRISON bosses shut down 80 Facebook accounts being run by inmates on mobile phones smuggled into Scotland's jails last year.

Officials probed 118 allegations prisoners were running accounts on the social-networking site from behind bars. A total of 250 pages have been shut down since the Scottish Prison Service began a Facebook crackdown in November 2010.

The sites are mainly run from inside jails using smartphones and have been used by convicts to taunt victims or contact fellow criminals.

The latest figures, released under freedom of information legislation, show Shotts high-security prison in Lanarkshire had the highest number of prisoners using Facebook last year.

Investigations were launched into 27 accounts with 21 being shut down.

Mobile phone blocking technology was introduced last month at Shotts and Glenochil in Clackmannanshire.

A Scottish Prison Service spokesman said: "The possession of a mobile phone in prison is a criminal offence."