A politics student has spoken of his anxiety after a vile Twitter troll stole his identity.
Tony Anderson, 27, who is studying in Glasgow but lived in Edinburgh prior to his studies, has said that the whole ordeal has caused him a lot of stress. The young man, who grew up in care and is an advocate for others from the same background, has been left baffled as to why someone would want to pretend to be him.
He was alerted to the issue after a lecturer friend from his university asked him if he had another Twitter account because someone had been commenting with his name and picture on his tweets. He says he has reported the profile and is awaiting a response from Twitter.
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An unknown person used a picture of Tony as well as his name and tried to pass themselves off as him when interacting with people he knew on Twitter. The fake profile was commenting below posts of people that Tony follows. After being contacted by Edinburgh Live, Twitter confirmed the offending account has now been "permanently suspended."
On one occasion they told a friend of his to kill their cat and posted a similarly sickening post about a friend's dog. Tony is worried that if the profile is not removed, then his dream future career in politics could be harmed.
Tony said: “I was asked by a lecturer friend of mine if I had another Twitter account because someone was impersonating me and commenting on their tweets. I felt sick and anxious as this account was passing itself off as me and it would be easy for those seeing this account replying to tweets to assume it was me who was making the comments.
“I wish I knew why someone would try and steal my identity. It might be someone who has an issue with me or my views but it could also be someone who has too much time on their hands.
“This incident has caused me a lot of stress because the comments they made are disgusting and those who know me thankfully know that I would never say anything that despicable. I have reported the account to Twitter and I am still waiting on a reply but in the meantime the account remains and could continue to cause irreparable damage to my image as I still aim to get into politics after university and the relationships with people.
“The worst one was a comment saying that a friend of mine should kill their cat and the other times its been mainly memes or harassing people.
"Whilst my identity has been stolen, I do not believe the police would do anything as they are, quite rightly, dealing with other more serious incidents."
Tony adds that he is concerned about the rise in identity theft in society at the moment. He says that not only can people lose money or other items but that they can be placed in the position that he finds himself in where his character is called into question by distasteful posts.
He continued: “I do worry about the increase in identity theft. This doesn’t just have to be those who are victims and lose money or other items.
“It can be people like myself where people could believe that the account is mine and I could lose friends over this. If I could give advice to people it's that whilst this can be a horrible experience, know that you have done nothing wrong and follow the processes of reporting the account.
“Make people aware of the fraudulent account, contact police if necessary and most of all keep your friends around you as this will be a time where you need people to speak to and to be around.”
A Twitter spokesperson said: "The account referenced was permanently suspended for violations of our impersonation policy."
If you have been the victim of an identity theft online that has caused you stress or discomfort then please feel free to contact us at: Jacob.Farr@reachplc.com
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