The result was highly expected on Friday morning when users found messages on compromised accounts in the morning that read, "hey, i've been having better sex and longer with this here", followed by a link to a Web site selling a herbal Viagra substitute.

However, it is reported to be just another example of the latest phishing trick to hit Twitter.

Ed Miliband, a British Cabinet member and the country's secretary for energy and climate change, posted Friday morning on twitter, "Oh dear it seems like I've fallen victim to twitter's latest 'phishing' scam". The tweet had been removed from his Twitter stream.

"Miliband needs to do more than just tweet an explanation for his bizarre tweets," says says Graham Cluley of security firm Sophos.

"He also needs to change his password, and think long and hard about whether he is using that same password on any other websites", he added.

Other reports reported that BBC correspondent Nick Higham and the country's Press Complaints Commission were also affected

While some of the accounts are believed to have been hacked by software programs looking for weak passwords, at least some were through Twitter direct messages that tried to entice users to click through to see a message from a young, attractive woman.