Twenty percent of Britons have managed to send racy texts to the wrong person, and nearly one in 10 has beencaught red-handed "sexting," according to a poll on Tuesday.

Under-25s are the most careless, with 43 percent admitting to sending fruity texts to the wrong contact. Men and women were equally guilty.

"Text and picture messaging has now become so second nature that people are less cautious, leading to messages frequently going astray," said Keir McConomy, Managing Director of SellMyMobile.com which commissioned the survey.

"A key aspect of text messaging is that it allows a more detached method of communication. This was part of its initialpopularity and a likely explanation for the large number of people willing to send out explicit content."

The survey of 1,097 mobile phone users also revealed that one in five respondents fail to wipe their phones of personal content such as contacts, messages and pictures before selling, giving away or recycling their mobiles.

(Read by Lee Hannon. Lee Hannon is a journalist at the China Daily Web site.)

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(Agencies)