The boss of BT admitted on Wednesday that customers could not be guaranteed 100% privacy when using the internet or mobile devices and called for changes to "murky" laws on data collection.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Gavin Patterson addressed the issues thrown open by the Guardian's investigation into the NSA through the whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Asked if he wanted more laws, Patterson, who became the boss of BT recently, said: "Exactly, making it clear. It's just too murky at the moment it needs to be transparent and needs to be clear guidelines about what's acceptable and what isn't.

"The legislation has to catch up. This is a challenge for the many different parts of our business models, it's often several years behind. It's not fit for purpose today. Everybody recognises the internet plays a role in protecting us and we've got to make sure it's not intrusive and also protects the rights to the individual. I don't think the legislation has managed to keep up".

Could there be 100% privacy? "I think that's unlikely and I think that's zero security," Patterson.

President Barack Obama on Friday announced reforms to the NSA, ending government storage of phone data and sparking fresh debate about the way data is collected.

Marissa Mayer, the boss of Yahoo, said it should be clear what is being disclosed. "What's murky about some of what is happing today is people don't necessary know what data is being collected and about what is being used," she said, calling for more clarity.

"2014 will be a tipping point … It will change everyone's daily routines very fundamentally." Mayer stressed Yahoo was clear customers owned their own data.

Meyer said it was not just downloading new apps on to smart phones, butnew ways to connect, pointing to 150,000 people allowing strangers into their homes through the Airbnb rental service.

The chairman and chief executive of Cisco, John Chambers, called for co-operation. He said: "We're not a service provider, we don't share our code with anyone. We come at it from a different perspective. We need rules of the road that everyone can live with … We need all companies to come up with general guidelines." Countries need to work together to solve these issues, he said.

"We need rules of the road, especially amongst countries that are very closely allied. It's been the wild west around the world."

Patterson said: "I think when it comes down to it people recognise that they have to give up some of their privacy to be protected, I don't think it will be ever be zero."

The BT boss also said BT was working on bringing one gigabite of bandwidth to homes through the Gfast project.