Only a few hours after news breaking of the suicide of Linkin Park frontman Chester Bennington, hackers had targeted the Twitter feed of his widow Talinda, with the account tweeting confessional messages in which she claimed she had driven her husband to take his own life.

The hacker posted a total of seven messages, with "Talinda" confessing that she only married Bennington for his money, and was having an affair with a fellow member of Linkin Park. Several of the messages were retweeted and liked hundreds of times in the short period in which they were up. All of the tweets have since been deleted, though Bennington's account is still active.

Bennington was found hanged at his residence in Palos Verdes yesterday.

“I guess this is the time to say it but I have been cheating on Chester with Mike Shinoda,” the tweet read.

Some fans were initially uncertain as to the legitimacy of the tweets, one expressing "I truly hope your account has been hacked, as I don't want to believe you can be so horrible towards Chester's passing." Another added "why was someone who loved him be so cruel to him and hurtful [sic]".

But the majority of responses were immediately dismissive of the inflammatory messages, with many condemning the hacker for exploiting Bennington's grief.

41-year-old Chester Bennington and his wife, with whom he had three children, were previously targeted by a cyberstalker in 2008.

Devon Townsend hacked into the couple's emails and sent threatening messages to the pair, a crime that resulted in Townsend being sentenced to two years in jail.