With the social media being cluttered by celeb imposters, it’s tough for star-struck social media trekkers to filter out the fakers from the real ones.
Often, the identity theft goes unnoticed until it causes any real harm to the celebs.
Katrina Kaif, whose handle has 261,525 followers, is a fake one. When false stories of the star had started circulating, her spokesperson had then stepped in to clarify that she isn’t on the social media circuit.
“There is someone who is impersonating Katrina Kaif and it is causing trouble,” her agent had said. Case in point being, her latest tweet that read, “I don’t know who I am. I’m lost and I’m broken. I’m shattered pieces of that girl I used to be.”
But the latest to find her identity misused was ‘Dirty Picture’ star Vidya Balan. Her tweet imposter went on to befriend her Bollywood friends and fans.
“Vidya was shocked to learn from many people in the industry that they’ve had a tweet-chat with ‘her’, when in actuality she doesn’t even have a twitter account,” informs a source.
Vidya has now gone on record to state that the twitter handle “@realvidyabalan is fake”.
Even, newcomer Yaami Gautam had similar tales of ghost encounters with her friends and fans.
In fact, when the hoopla surrounding the Saifeena wedding was at its peak, a twitter account that claimed to be the star’s started posting wedding pictures online.
“Since Kareena isn’t on twitter, it was a clear case of how someone else was representing her online. They could’ve been lifting images off the web and posting it in on twitter,” informed an entertainment journalist.
The @KareenaOnline handle that reads; “Welcome to the first Twitter page for Kareena Kapoor's well-wishers, delivering news and exclusive pictures. Please support and retweet!” has 90,950 followers.
Even actress Asin had made experience on twitter, with her imposter indulging in an initimate conversation on twitter with another actress.
In fact, some stars even use the “fake” tag when they tweet damaging quotes about their peers. Earlier ‘Band Baaja Baraat’ star Ranveer Singh claimed his twitter account was fake after negative posts about Salman Khan’s ‘Ek Tha Tiger’ featured.
“The information on a tweet being attributed to Ranveer Singh in some sections of the media about his comments on Ek Tha Tiger is completely incorrect and baseless. The tweet being referred to is of an impersonator and not of Ranveer. While Ranveer is on twitter and his twitter handle is @RanveerOfficial, he has never tweeted till date,” his spokesperson told the media.
Legendary actor Amitabh Bachchan, who is prolific on twitter, also suffers from id thefts. There’s one proclaiming that he’s the real one with; “This is my real twitter account – Amitabh Bachchan”, along with a link to his blog. The account has 65,409 followers.
Ranbir Kapoor, whose profile reads; “Hi there It's me Ranbir Kapoor.I want to make friends worldwide.Have a nice day,” has 119,107 followers.
For instance, there are multiple impostors for Shah Rukh Khan. They are not just attracting followers, but hackers too. ‘Oh boy. Getting hacked again,’ he tweets. But for a wannabe SRK, a fan following of 32,493 people is quite an impressive number, don’t you think?
The fake Hrithik Roshan, on the other hand, has a fan following of 3,983 people. He tweets, ‘@priyankachopra hey Priyanka, Hrithik here. I have just joined twitter, help me out...brrrr’. He probably isn’t aware that the actress is already friends with the real Hrithik Roshan.
Aamir Khan too has a fake account, with 7,230 followers, with a link of the actor’s blog on his account in a bid to authenticate his identity. His ‘bio’ status reads ‘Actor/Director/Producer (This is my Official Twitter Account. To verify, please check my website for Twitter link)’.
Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.
