In 2012, Bulgaria was not the most corrupt among the EU Member States, according to Transparency International's newly published Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI).

Publishing its annual Corruption Perceptions Index on Wednesday, the Berlin-based body ranked Bulgaria 75th out of a total 176 countries.

This year, TI ranks countries on a scale from 0 (perceived to be highly corrupt) to 100 (perceived to be very clean).

Greece with 36 points is 94th and the most corrupt in the EU, while Bulgaria is the second most corrupt. Romania is ahead of Bulgaria with its 66th spot.

In the Corruption Perceptions Index 2012 Denmark, Finland and New Zealand tie for first place with scores of 90, helped by strong access to information systems and rules governing the behavior of those in public positions.

Afghanistan, North Korea and Somalia once again cling to the bottom rung of the index. In these countries the lack of accountable leadership and effective public institutions underscore the need to take a much stronger stance against corruption.

Underperformers in the Corruption Perceptions Index 2012 also include the Eurozone countries most affected by the financial and economic crisis. Transparency International has consistently warned Europe to address corruption risks in the public sector to tackle the financial crisis, calling for strengthened efforts to corruption-proof public institutions, TI writes Wednesday in a press release.

In 2011, Bulgaria registered a score of 3.3 (out of 10), which placed it 86th out of 178 countries together with Jamaica, Panama, Sri Lanka and Serbia.

The Corruption Perceptions Index 2012 has been calculated using an updated methodology. TI now uses an approach that provides greater clarity on how the index is constructed, making it easier to trace how the data from the sources are rescaled for inclusion in the Index. The updated method also means that a country's Corruption Perceptions Index score will better capture changes in perceptions of corruption in the public sector of that country over time.

The organization stresses that due to the update in the methodology, 2011 CPI scores are not comparable with CPI 2012 scores. To reflect the updates that have been made to the methodology, the CPI 2012 will henceforth be presented on a 0-100 scale.

Previously, the CPI was based on perceptions of corruption in each country/territory, relative to the other countries scored and ranked on this index. This was because the Index captured the rank position of each country in each data source, so that country scores were highly dependent on the changes in scores of the countries around it in the index. From 2012, TI will be using the raw scores from each of the data sources, which provide greater transparency as to how the CPI scores have been constructed and better enable capturing changes over time.

Previous editions of the CPI drew on more than one year's worth of data from the business surveys, where more than one year of data fell within the data period of the CPI. From 2012, we will only be using the most recent year's worth of data from each source for each country. This will better show changes from one year to the next.