The newspaper refers to the situation in Denmark, where almost 44,000 passports were lost last year.
Since 2010, a whopping total of 226,311 passports have been lost in the country of approximately 5.6 million people, while just 61,399 were ever recovered, the newspaper said.
Therefore, it is safe to assume that Danish passports remain in great demand on the black market, where they are worth about 3,150 euros, according to the Berlingske.
The officials added that a whopping 34 million passports have been lost or stolen in Europe since 2002.
"It is a frighteningly high figure," Magnus Ranstorp of the Swedish Defense Institute was quoted by Berlingske as saying.
The Swedish newspaper Expressen reported, in turn, that 2015 has seen an ever-increasing number of lost passports in Sweden, where many such documents were finally found on the black market.
Meanwhile, Interpol and Europol officials have warned that the lost or stolen passports pose a threat to European security.
It is worth noting in this regard that at least two of the terrorists behind the deadly attacks that occurred in Paris in November 2015 used fake passports. At least 130 people were killed and 368 more injured in the attacks.
