Following an online manhunt that turned up a long list of suspects, Fake Stephen Conroy decided to turn himself in before he could be outed. "OK, so here it is; Fake Stephen Conroy = Leslie Nassar," he wrote yesterday.

Nassar's LinkedIn profile says he is a "Senior Emerging Technology Specialist (Mobile)" at Telstra and has previously worked for the ABC, spearheading its podcasting efforts. Nassar confirmed this but refused to provide any further comments. "I've been instructed not to talk to the press, so you'll need to talk to Telstra PR," he said.

Telstra has not responded to calls requesting comment. A spokesman for Senator Conroy would not comment on the fact that Fake Stephen Conroy was a Telstra staff member but said Senator Conroy was aware of the fake profile. "Satire is an important part of any healthy democracy," he said.

Since the profile was created in October last year, Fake Stephen Conroy has published 708 tweets and attracted 1531 followers. He has been called on to write satirical guest articles for Crikey and ZDNet.com.au. The trend towards fake online profiles was sparked by US journalist Daniel Lyons, who famously created the Fake Steve Jobs blog in 2006. Lyons was outed by The New York Times in August 2007 but not before amassing a cult following online and garnering a mention from Apple founder Steve Jobs himself.

Fake Steve Jobs was ranked 37th on Business 2.0's "50 Who Matter Now" feature and Lyons went on in 2007 to release a book titled Options: The Secret Life Of Steve Jobs, A Parody. Nassar followed a similar style with Fake Stephen Conroy. Some examples of his 140-character-or-less tweets are:

"Apparently LOL means 'Laugh Out Loud' and not 'Lots Of Love'. Now I'm going to have to re-read all those internet comments about me." "about to board my flight to Melbourne .. nabbed seat 1B! a person in a wheelchair was going to get it .. lucky IM CONROY! Trump card played!" "When I Googled for information on how to circumvent surrogacy laws in Victoria, I bookmarked the results so we could ban the sites later."

"The filter is a community service; it's not just about removing content, we can also repair content. We can make it truthier." "I don't think it's unreasonable to compare the National Filter Network to a cure for Super-AIDS; both of them protect children."

"Dear journalists; please do not continue to report on my enormous penis and ability to please the ladies. My personal life is off-limits." "Today I received an I-Phone. The IT people tell me that it is biometrically activated, but no matter how much I lick it, it won't turn on."