Ministers have come under pressure after the UK Covid Inquiry found that they had failed to hand over any communications.

First Minister Humza Yousaf said earlier this week that the Scottish government’s social media guidance was to “routinely delete WhatsApp messages” but said he had kept his.

Scottish Information Commissioner David Hamilton said that information shared on “non-corporate messaging tools” by public authorities would “fall under the scope of Scotland’s FOI laws.”

Mr Hamilton’s office also said that the commissioner wanted public authorities “to identify and consider all appropriate recorded information when responding to FOI requests, including, where relevant, information recorded in exchanges made through WhatsApp, Microsoft Teams, or other messaging tools”.

The statement added: “In circumstances where the commissioner finds that public bodies are not appropriately searching relevant sources in order to respond to information requests, he may consider regulatory action in order to support necessary improvements.

“Where the commissioner considers that an authority’s records management or records retention practices fall short of the standard set out in the FOI Act’s Code of Practice on Records Management (the Section 61 Code) he may, following consultation with the Keeper of the Records of Scotland, also consider regulatory action to support improvement.”

Mr Hamilton said: “I have been reviewing my live caseload and am liaising with the Keeper of the Records to determine whether regulatory action may be required in specific cases.”