Facebook Hoaxer Part of Plot to Smear Bilawal: Dad

Several news editors and internet surfers fell hook, line and sinker for a Facebook hoaxer pretending to be Benazir Bhutto's son and political heir—and an aide for his dad charged that it was part of a smear campaign by the Pakistani government. The fake Facebook site has 19-year-old Bilawal confessing he is "not a born leader" and is a big fan of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer."

The Huffington Post, the Daily Telegraph and Agence France Presse quoted from the ersatz site, reports the New York Times. “It’s the government,” an aide to Bilawal's dad, Asif Ali Zardari, told the Times of London. “They’re trying to make it look like it was a mistake to appoint him" to head Bhutto's political party. The prankster, apparently a woman who calls herself Tonay, later 'fessed up and Facebook pulled the page. (More Bilawal Bhutto Zardari stories.)