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Vodafone suspends staff member over tawdry tweet

By Barry Collins

Posted on 9 Feb 2010 at 08:38

Vodafone has reportedly suspended a member of its web team, after the employee issued an offensive message on the company's Twitter account.

Followers of the VodafoneUK Twitter account were rather taken aback on Friday, when the message "fed up of dirty homo's, going after some beaver" appeared on the company's account.

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The incident allegedly occurred after a PC that was logged into the Vodafone Twitter account was left unattended in the office.

Vodafone swiftly removed the offensive tweet and sent out a flurry of apologies to followers. "We're really sorry. A severe breach of rules by staff in our building, dealing with that internally. Please keep your faith in us," one apology read.

The incident once again highlights the dangers of social-networking accounts falling into the wrong hands.

Read Paul Ockenden's guide to putting your business on Twitter for advice on professional social networking.

User comments

This is old news, I read about it days ago in the Guardian. It made me laugh though, it reminded me of the opening scenes in that Simon Pegg film the 'The Big Nothing' where he's working in a Call centre :-)

By rjp2000 on 9 Feb 2010

Right hands

This didn't fall into the wrong hands. This was an employee that had access to this. So, the only danger highlighted is not to employee idiots. But that's always been the case, regardless of technology.

By Steve_Adey on 9 Feb 2010