Scam: Lady Gaga promises iPad's on Twitter and Facebook

Following her Twitter account being hacked, the singer who has more than 17 million followers promised each a free iPad. This stunt was also repeated on Lady Gaga’s Facebook page which has more than 45 million fans.

When conducting a scam, the best is to have as many people as possible see it. Lady Gaga’s digital presence on social networks Twitter and Facebook has taken a beating, with her accounts having been hacked.

The singer’s official Twitter account - which has more than 17 million followers – saw a tweet posted on Monday saying that in the spirit of Christmas, each follower would receive an iPad 2 for free.

In this tweet, a shortcut link led users to an online form to fill in. This provided cybercriminals with user’s names, telephone numbers and private email addresses. A similar scam tweet had been seen previously pushing MacBooks.

The hack was confirmed by a tweet sent by Lady Gaga after her account had been restored to normal. When interrogating the bitly service, TechCrunch noticed that the URL shortcut for the iPad’s had been clicked on 8000 times.

Security company Sophos noticed that a similar scam was also conducted on Lady Gaga’s Facebook page, which has 45 million fans. The shortcut URL generated at least 130 000 clicks, with the advertised prize being a new Lady gaga iPad, although in reality the online form one again had the aim of collecting users personal information. Like on Twitter, a message posted yesterday indicated "the hacking is over ".

Be it Twitter or Facebook, similar scams have been found on other artists pages, although Lady Gaga was the most followed to have so far fallen victim.